Mirai Shoujo Brigitte
by Crusader Jerome
Summary: Chrono Harlaown can't seem to get a vacation without being interrupted by an incident involving a little girl with issues. Time travel is a new one, though. It doesn't help that her library books are overdue. Post-A's, pre-StrikerS.
1. Chapter 1: Chrono Hates Vacation

**This here is a story I've been posting on SpaceBattles and Sufficient Velocity over the past few months. I figured I might as well put it here too. To whoever's reading this, please review, and share if you like it.**

* * *

Crusader Jerome presents:

 **Mirai Shoujo Brigitte**

(a Lyrical Nanoha fanfiction)

* * *

Chapter 1: Chrono Hates Vacation

Chrono Harlaown was convinced that vacations were a lie. This was not an old opinion from the early days of his career, before he had seen any serious action. No, this was a belief that he had formed based on experience, and much against his will. It wasn't the seemingly endless paperwork; compared to field work, Chrono found paperwork relaxing and would regularly do it on his days off. It wasn't that vacations never really happened, either; Chrono had taken an entire week away from duty on multiple occasions. It was what happened on vacations that invalidated the premise of the thing. A quiet trip with no action in sight was, he had found, merely an excuse for the universe to throw something painful in the Bureau's face. Thus, Chrono stuck to paperwork as much as possible. It was best not to leave any openings, wasn't it?

Of course, the paperwork did run out at times, and when those times came, he could only hope that the oncoming incident would not involve A-class Lost Logia and little girls with issues. The last time he had taken a serious vacation, Nanoha had been severely injured while dogfighting with drones. The time before that was the Arthra's recreational "tour of duty" that had neatly coincided with the final Book of Darkness incident. Sometimes, Chrono wondered if the universe had it out for him and his friends in particular, but he usually concluded that dealing with unpleasant things fell to them because they could handle it. It was merely the price of competence.

The rationalization failed to make him any less paranoid.

* * *

A teenager and a young adult ran through the alleys of Cranagan's industrial district at a semi-urgent pace. The work day had ended hours ago, so the area was deserted except for these Bureau mages and their quarry.

"I have a bad feeling about this," said Chrono.

Yuuno, running next to him, frowned. "Why is that?"

"It's vacation time."

Yuuno's face twisted in confusion. "I think I'm missing some context here."

"The context, Scrya, is every vacation I've ever had. Now, quiet. She's stopped moving."

[How far away?] Yuuno asked, switching to telepathy.

[Three blocks,] Chrono replied. [The security feed is giving me her location, but I can't see what she's doing. Barrier Jackets up, just in case.]

The two made their way carefully to a warehouse that looked exactly like every other warehouse in the vicinity-drab-colored walls and tiny, dust-crusted windows. The door had definitely been used, though. [Shall we?] Chrono asked.

[After you.]

Chrono threw open the door with more force than was strictly necessary. "Don't run away!" he called. "We just want to talk."

A girl, about ten years old, blinked in surprise from her set on the floor. Her hand froze in the action of scrolling through a holographic display from the bracelet Device on her other hand.

Yuuno stepped forward and raised his hands in a placating gesture. "Don't worry; this isn't an arrest. We're just...mildly curious as to how you managed to break into the Infinity Library's systems and gain administrator access to the databases. That's something of a major security breach."

The girl lowered her eyes. "Used your password. Not sorry." Her right hand went back to scrolling through the holographic feed.

Yuuno's eyebrow twitched. "Pardon? Do you, perhaps, mean the time-sensitive hexadecimal encryption/decryption algorithm that I invented myself, implemented two months ago, and have revealed to no one but myself?"

The girl nodded. "Yeah, that one. Is there anything else?" she asked, glancing at Chrono. "I want to get back to this. I can only read two files at a time while carrying on a conversation."

"See, that's the thing," said Yuuno. "Except for one, all the files you took are completely declassified and available to the general public. If you had asked, I or any of the staff would have given them to you without a fuss and without you _tampering with a government database!_ That's a crime on Administered worlds."

"Can I have them, then?" the girl asked.

Yuuno was growing red in the face, so Chrono decided to step in. "A moment, if you please," he said. "Before we get into an argument of legality, what documents did you take?"

"History and geography of several Administered worlds, papers on the mechanics of the Dimensional Sea and Imaginary Space, and the complete documentation of the Arc-en-Ciel," said Yuuno.

"Archaeological records, too," said the girl. "Don't forget those."

Yuuno growled. "That's included in history and geography."

"Sure." The girl cocked her head, her expression blank.

"Okaaay..." said Chrono. "Why do you need the blueprints for the Arc-en-Ciel?"

The girl shrugged, her hand still moving on the display. "Can't sabotage one properly unless I know how it works, can I?"

"And this is important because..."

"Private business. Sorry." Her hand left the display to tap the bracelet Device on her other arm.

"All right, then: who put you up to this? I won't accept a non-answer." Chrono held up his Storage Device's card form. "Don't try me."

The girl paused, looking at both of them in turn. She sighed. "It's just me. My dad had the idea, him and some guy you don't know, but..." Abruptly, she stood and closed the hologram. "It's been a nice chat, but I have to go now." Her Device chimed, and a teleport circle flashed beneath her feet. She grinned at Yuuno, showing her teeth. "Teasing you really is fun!" The air shimmered around her.

[Chrono, grab on! I'll track her teleport.]

Chrono gripped Yuuno's wrist, and all three vanished.

Chrono and Yuuno rematerialized to find the girl already casting a second teleport. She waved at them. "Good luck keeping up with me!"

Yuuno only grunted and pushed more effort into his spell.

Several minutes later, Yuuno was beginning to get annoyed. The girl was leading them in what amounted to a game of tag around the warehouse district. Following a complex teleport chain by hand was a skill in which he had only recently achieved proficiency, while the girl was so fluid with her escape routes that he would have had trouble even without a passenger.

 _I need to change my tactics,_ he thought. Then, to Chrono, [I can't keep this up. She'll lose us soon.] They teleported. [Can you charge a bind between teleports and cast it as soon as we come out?]

Chrono's Device began to glow. They teleported.

Yuuno risked a glance and saw that Chrono's spell was stable. [Right. After this jump.] On impulse, he threw in more power than he needed, aiming to overshoot the target slightly. They teleported.

They appeared right behind the girl, who spun to face them with shock on hers.

Chrono tapped her on the head with his Device. "Struggle Bind." She cried out as the spectral chains wrapped around her, breaking her concentration and dispelling her teleport-in-progress. Chrono turned to Yuuno. "I believe that this constitutes resisting arrest after freely confessing to a crime. Do you have anything to add, since it was your facility that was broken into?"

"Hey!" whined the girl, vainly twisting in the bind. "You said you wouldn't arrest me."

"You lost the privilege of turning yourself in when you ran away."

"Oh," she said. "So that's how it works."

"Look here," said Yuuno, trying and failing to hide his annoyance. "I'm sure you can imagine how suspicious it is that a ten-year-old managed to hack one of the most complex password systems in existence in order to download a classified weapon design."

"I'm eleven."

He stepped forward to stand in front of her. "You seem to be treating this like a game with no stakes. _What is your deal?_ "

She sighed heavily. "Do you remember how I said, earlier, that my dad came up with the plan? He was going to do it himself, but I did it first so he wouldn't have to."

"You're not talking about the files from the Library any more, are you?"

She shook her head. "Nope! I'm not giving you anything else. But I will tell you one thing." She forced her hands together, despite the chains, and flipped a tiny switch on her bracelet. "You're ten years too early to beat me in a game of teleport tag."

The chains shuddered and disintegrated, and Yuuno's Barrier Jacket began to fray from an invisible pressure.

"It's an AMF!" Chrono shouted. "Get back!"

Too late, Yuuno noticed the girl's left fist in his stomach, a gauntlet where the bracelet had been. He staggered back.

"S2U, Stinger Blade!"

Yuuno fell to one knee as Chrono summoned a cloud of spectral blades. The girl hopped backward, bracing her gauntlet with her right hand. "Sorry for hitting you, but I can't let you guys stop me," she called, sounding...genuinely apologetic? "Anyway, it's been fun. Maybe I'll see you guys later, have a rematch in ten years, you know?" She breathed in. "Calliope, Spell Release."

"Acknowledged. Coordinates set. Transferring."

The pressure of the AMF field cut off, and Chrono immediately hurled his blades at the girl, but he was too late. A teleport circle flashed beneath her feet, and she vanished, leaving the projectiles to embed themselves in the ground where she had stood.

The two stood and watched the spent mana dissipate into the air. Finally, Chrono said, "As I said, vacations. Vacations and young girls."

Yuuno didn't bother to answer.


	2. Chapter 2: Enter the Future Girl

Chapter 2: Enter the Future Girl

Jail Scaglietti was normally a patient and reserved man. However, his composure was not unbreakable; he was susceptible to bouts of undignified rapture upon making a new discovery or unlocking some new challenge. The present occasion did not qualify, but it came close.

Uno's face appeared on his holoscreen. _"Doctor, we are still unable to identify the cause of the dimensional quake. The effects are confined to one room for now, but it's getting stronger. If it goes much farther, the Bureau might investigate."_

"Ah, thank you, Uno," said Jail. "Continue to observe, please. I'll attempt to investigate at a closer range."

Uno nodded. "Understood. Please be cautious, Doctor."

* * *

It caused his spine to tingle with jealousy that one of the secrets of the universe had been unlocked without him. And yet, the novelty of the event itself almost made up for it.

* * *

It was breathtaking.

A nascent dimensional rift, appearing spontaneously inside his main base. A rather inconvenient spot, but not unwelcome. At any other area, it might have attracted TSAB investigators. The strange iridescent not-color seeped through the warping space, yet it hung back, as if reluctant to be released. It was beautiful.

Jail formed two more barriers between it and himself.

 _"Those won't be much help if the rift expands faster than you expect, Doctor."_

Jail smirked. "While that is correct, Uno, I find it much more satisfying to witness the phenomenon firsthand, despite the danger. Surely you understand."

Uno didn't reply.

"Ah, well," he sighed. "Keep the girls away from this room, would you? Their presence would only complicate things."

Jail returned his gaze to the shimmering glow hanging in the air before him. The affected area seemed to pulse every few seconds, and he could feel the vibrations as they tugged on his Linker Core. He breathed slowly in and out. Ah, the thrill of the unknown...

"I give it two minutes before it pops," said Quattro, decloaking next to him.

Jail frowned at the girl. "Now is not the proper time for such antics, Quattro."

"Aww, but isn't it all right if I just stand next to you? You won't even know I'm here!"

"I suppose," murmured Jail, already resuming his analysis. Now, how best to examine it? There had been no noticeable change in the status of the disturbance since the first minute after its appearance. Could it be prodded with a release of mana, perhaps? But that would rob whatever was creating the rift of the chance to perform its task by itself. Ah, the familiar dilemma of observation and experimental agency.

The glow flared, sending a ripple through the stacked barriers. Jail gripped the side of his head at the sudden pain and grit his teeth until it subsided. The glow was fading now, leaving only a faint overlay on the space like the afterimage of a blinding light.

 _"Get back, Doctor!"_ shouted Uno over the comlink.

The spot flared again and burst. A wave of pain swept over Jail as his barriers disintegrated, one by one. Quattro screamed behind him. Turning around, he snatched her and rushed to the periphery of the room, where he collapsed against the wall. He looked back at the now fully-formed dimensional rift and grimaced. He had been careless. A dimensional rift was too much of a possibility in his work with Lost Logia for him to ignore the risks. Yet, this one occurrence was special.

Now that the rift had opened, the tension in spacetime seemed to have resolved itself, and Jail stared into the void of Imaginary Space as if it were the gateway to the secrets of the universe. Imaginary Space-the anti-dimension that devoured magic, from which nothing ever returned. And something was coming out.

A grin broke over Jail's face. "Quattro," he whispered, "this is a marvelous time to be alive."

She groaned. "If you say so, Doctor."

The dark shape in the rift grew larger, and Quattro scooted away from him and cloaked her presence again. Jail pushed himself to his feet and eyed the rift warily. The thing inside shifted as it drew closer, rotating and swapping bits of itself to and from a fourth dimension that he couldn't see. Odd flares of what looked like particle drive exhaust popped in and out of existence, cycling through the same fourth-dimensional space. Jail's breath caught. _A mass-based transport system through Imaginary Space...of course! It's the only viable option. But traditional spatiotemporal coordinate systems don't apply there, or someone would have succeeded already. Could it be that Imaginary Space is a hyberbolic geometry? That would explain why it can't be mapped to any mathematical formula. But the computational power required to develop even a basic approximation, and without magic, no less..._

"This," he whispered, "may be the greatest scientific moment in the recorded history of Dimensional Space."

Disappointingly, no one reacted to his statement except the machine (for he could supply no specific designation beyond that), which gave a final push with its thrusters and passed over the boundary of the rift, having just enough momentum to immediately crash to the floor as gravity took hold of it. It slid a few centimeters and stopped. The room went quiet but for the faint scrape and hum of components moving below the blackish film covering the machine.

The noise stopped. For a moment, it was really silent. Then, the machine began to contract and disassemble itself into folded space like a Device.

Revealed from the central compartment was the figure of a girl. The machine retracted into a thick bracelet on her left wrist. She exhaled heavily and looked up at Jail with green eyes. They narrowed.

"Doctor Scaglietti. I was directed to seek your assistance on a...personal matter," she said.

Ten or eleven years old, by her voice. Close to Dieci and Cinque's apparent age.

"What might that be, Miss..."

"Vert. Brigitte Vert. You haven't heard of me, but I've heard of you."

"Miss Vert, then. Indulge my curiosity, but I've never encountered such an intriguing manner of dimensional transport as what you just used. Am I to understand that you navigated to my secret base through Imaginary Space without causing a dangerous dimensional quake?"

She nodded, looking pleased with herself. "First try, too." She glanced over her shoulder. "Don't worry about the hole. It'll scab over in a few hours. It should be fine if you don't cast anything nearby."

"I...see," said Jail. "Pardon me for asking, but how did you obtain the coordinates of this base? It is a relevant security concern."

Brigitte waved it off. "Don't worry about that, either. I got them from somebody who knows you really well. He won't tell anyone." She paused. "Except me. He already told me, though, so that's a moot point."

"Who was it?"

"Bend over, and I'll tell you." He lowered his head, and she whispered in his ear, "His name is Jail Scaglietti, and he went to prison after blowing up the Saint's Cradle over Cranagan."

Jail stiffened. He forced a smile over his face. "Well, that certainly makes things...interesting. I'm not sure what to make of it."

Brigitte bounced on her heels. "Oh, I think these files will help. Here." She tapped her bracelet Device.

Uno's voice came over the link. _"Doctor, I'm receiving an encrypted transmission. It's...our encryption. Five data files, each containing the full profile of a Rare Skill."_

 _Which ones?_ he sent back.

 _"Nothing I've seen before. Curious. The notes are in your style...and dated 0088, Mid calendar."_

Jail stared at the girl in front of him. "You're claiming to come from the future."

Brigitte grinned. "Yup! Took you long enough. I have the DNA samples to go with those, too. Right here." She patted her bracelet.

"In that case," said Jail, "I'm sure we can come to some arrangement. But I have one more question. What need does such a well-equipped young lady have of us?"

Her face became serious. "Logistics. You have it, I don't."

"What sort? Supplies? Information? Transportation shouldn't be an issue, given the display just now."

Brigitte bit her lip. "Actually...it's not quite that simple. I have to conserve fuel, so there's no point in using Calliope for regular travel through D-space. What I really need is a fake ID so I can get into Midchilda without getting stopped by the Bureau. After that, it's just a way to get to Avenata. I'm sure you can help me arrange something, can't you, Doctor?" She fixed him with a pleading look.

Jail laughed. "I believe I can. Trying to decipher your technology, even with only the hint that it exists, would be enough to keep me busy for a decade, I'm sure."

Her pleading gave way to a mild glare. "I'm not letting you look at Calliope. You told me not to trust you."

Jail's smile faltered, but he held it up as best he could. "Of course. But, I hope we can consider this a friendly partnership, rather than a business contract. A business mentality is hardly conducive to proper collaboration, in my experience."

"No promises," said Brigitte, but even so, she visibly relaxed.

"Well, then, let's get you accommodated, shall we? We have plenty of spare rooms for you, if you don't mind. Also, as for the DNA samples, would you take those over to Uno, my secretary? Quattro will take you to her. Won't you, Quattro?"

Brigitte flinched as Quattro decloaked right next to her. "Sure, Doctor. Come on, you!" She grabbed the older girl by the hand and dragged her out of the room.

 _"Is this wise, Doctor?"_ asked Uno.

"I don't believe that Miss Vert is a threat. She has a loose handle on her emotions, as I'm sure you could discern. Did you notice how pleased she was at dominating her conversation with me?"

 _"Indeed. However, we have no idea of her true capabilities. It would be best to proceed with caution."_

"Quite, quite. Humor her, then. After you've run the preliminary analysis on the DNA samples, forge her official identification and compile a list of our contacts near Avenata."

 _"All of them, or just the smugglers?"_

"All of them, if you will. I'm sure that Miss Vert will request non-interference from us, given her line about not trusting us. However, I do intend to keep a hand in her project, whatever it is. As long as we do not act directly, she need never know." He rubbed his hands together. "I haven't met a girl this interesting in in a long time."


	3. Chapter 3: Talk to Me

Chapter 3: Talk to Me

"Yuuno," said Nanoha, "you've been awfully quiet."

Yuuno looked up. "Oh, sorry. I just...have something on my mind."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Don't trouble yourself," said Yuuno, shaking his head. "It's library business."

"Oh. I guess I'm imposing on you right now, aren't I?"

"Well, I _have_ been wondering why you had me come to the airport to see you off when I'm not even going on this vacation with you." Then, under his breath: "You're completely capable of carrying your own bags."

Nanoha ignored him and let her gaze sweep over the crowd. Her face lit up. "Oh, there she is. Fate, over here!"

Yuuno stood to the side as the two girls traded greetings and hugs, shuffling his feet while he waited. Finally, Fate disengaged herself and turned to him. "Yuuno. Have you made any progress on your investigation?"

"No, unfortunately. I would be working on that now, but Nanoha..." He gestured with the suitcase in his hand. "You know how she is."

"What! You had an investigation? Why didn't you tell me?" Nanoha tried to look hurt.

Yuuno sighed. "It's a need-to-know mission. Chrono only told Fate because she's an Enforcer."

"Oh. Sorry?" Nanoha offered an apologetic smile.

Yuuno began to massage his forehead. "It's fine. I won't have much to do until my sources get back to me. It's, well..." He trailed off. Abruptly, he took a a quick breath and muttered, "I have to go. I'll see you when you get back." He set Nanoha's suitcase on the ground and slipped away into the crowd.

Nanoha frowned. "If he was really that busy, he could have just refused to come."

Fate sighed. "I don't think you understand him quite as well as you think you do."

"Hey, it's not my fault that he buries himself in work and doesn't take much time to hang out."

"Like you do?"

"Excuse me? I'm taking a hot springs vacation trip with my best friends, and you call me a workaholic before we even get on the plane? That hurts, Fate."

"So did that Starlight Breaker of yours."

Nanoha sighed as they began to walk to their boarding gate. "You're never going to let go of that, are you."

* * *

Yuuno weaved through the thinning crowd. Several flights had been called, so the press of people was starting to let up. He broke into a jog. There was enough space to run, but he didn't want to draw attention to himself before he confirmed his suspicion.

There, just sitting down in the waiting area for a private flight. Light brown hair, the same shade that he remembered. The clothes were different, but it definitely looked like the girl from the other day.

In such situations, Yuuno reflected, there were three typical courses of action. The first was stealth, in which he was no expert. The second was to call for backup and surround the target with an unavoidable concentration of force. The third was his preferred choice.

He walked up to the girl and tapped her shoulder. She twisted her neck to look at him and froze.

"Hello," he said. "Remember me from the other day? Yuuno Scrya, Head Librarian of the Infinity Library. Do you mind if I sit down with you?"

She gaped. Having received no immediate response, Yuuno sat down in the seat next to her and cleared his throat. The girl blinked at him, her mouth still open. Collecting herself, she pinched the bridge of her nose and blinked hard, twice.

Her voice came out very small. "What do you want?"

"I'm not entirely sure," said Yuuno. "That depends on you. What do you want? You didn't say last time we met. If you give me a sufficient justification for your actions, and I deem you trustworthy, I'm willing to let you off with only a slap on the wrist."

The girl stared at him incredulously. "You're assuming that I'll tell you the truth? How do you _live_ with this much naivete?"

"I have friends to watch my back," said Yuuno. "Now answer my question." She opened her mouth to respond, but he added, "Don't give me the excuse that you're following your father's instructions. Tell me the whole story."

She deflated. "But...that's the only thing I'm allowed to tell you."

 _Curious_ , thought Yuuno. Aloud, he said, "Tell me about your father. What kind of person is he?"

The girl looked away. "Why...why do you want to know?"

Yuuno frowned. "I have a friend who had...a special task from her mother, when we first met. Her whole world was that one thing, and it kept her closed off from everyone." He shifted in his seat, turning toward her. "The way you acted yesterday was completely different from now. It's like that was a mask to hide something painful that you don't think you can share with anyone." He let his gaze wander for a moment. "Unless this is the front, which I would find even more worrying."

Her head snapped back in his direction, and she glared at him. "Saying something like that is really annoying, you know? Don't go prying into my personal affairs. It has nothing to do with you." She slid out of her seat and stood up, but he snatched her wrist to keep her from leaving.

"I'm sorry to have to correct you, but it is, in fact, my business," said Yuuno. "According to my contract, I can't let you go until I've accounted for all the materials you took from the Library. Call it a due date for your withdrawals, if you will, and I'm here to collect."

She tried to pull out of his grasp, but he didn't let go. "Ugh! I'm not going to build a weapon or anything like that. Just let me go."

"I don't think I should," said Yuuno. "I know I'm not very good at dealing with girls, but a troubled young lady like yourself should not be left alone."

The girl pulled harder. "Don't make me attack you," she growled.

"That would be a bad idea, considering that I have backup. Two Bureau mages, friends of mine, happen to be in this very airport right now. They don't know about you, but if you cause trouble...let it suffice to say that they have experience in dealing with anti-magilink fields."

The girl gasped. "You don't mean the Aces?" Her eyes widened. "What are _they_ doing here?"

Yuuno raised an eyebrow. "We have a mutual friend who works by the northern coast. Apparently, the hot springs there are quite enjoyable at this time of year."

"The northern coast?" the girl muttered. "Airport 8. That was...it's late April 0071. Crap! How did I miss that?"

"That statement is both correct and entirely devoid of fecal matter. Your choice of words is odd."

She grimaced. "How does somebody your age have a sense of humor like an old man? My dad's jokes are better than that, and that's not saying much."

"Well," said Yuuno, "in one sense, it was successful. You just told me that you appreciate your father's sense of humor. It's not quite as much as I had hoped to learn, but I'll take what I can."

The girl sighed and slapped her free hand over her forehead. "Can you not psychoanalyze me? And maybe, let go of my hand?"

"No," Yuuno said. "We're not finished."

"How about we have this conversation a week from now? I should be able to finish my project by then. It's nothing illegal, I promise."

"If it's not illegal, I suppose you won't mind if I go with you."

"But...ugh. Don't you have work to do with the Library?"

"My assistants can handle everything while I'm gone. And as I said, this is library business."

The girl glanced around quickly, then hissed, "Look, I'm doing perfectly legitimate things, but I've had to get help from some less scrupulous people. If we're seen together, that will raise a lot of inconvenient questions. Also, my flight from here is the one going to Coastal Airport 8, which would raise questions from your friends."

"Is that all?" asked Yuuno.

The girl paused. "Um, I suppose...?"

Yuuno took a few moments to think, then replied, "If there's nothing else to worry about, I can take care of it myself." He released her wrist and stood up. "I'll catch up to you at Airport 8. Don't try to lose me, or I'll be rather annoyed."

She crossed her arms. "You're a fool, you know that?"

"I don't doubt it." Yuuno turned to walk away, but paused. "However, I would rather be an informed fool than an ignorant pragmatist. It's a personal choice, but it hasn't backfired on me yet."

The girl cocked her head and scowled. "...How does this even apply to this situation? You're uninformed _and_ acting foolish."

"Perhaps," replied Yuuno, "but you are taking remarkable pains to convince me that you are not trustworthy. So far, it hasn't worked."

"Oh, you figured it out," she said, rolling her eyes. "Great! Maybe you could take the hint and go away so you don't muck up my plans?"

Yuuno shook his head.

"Oh well," she sighed. "You can't blame me for trying. I'll be going now, though. It wouldn't do to let my escort see us together." She turned and marched away, very pointedly not looking back.

Yuuno, musing, watched her until she was out of sight. He stood up. _Well,_ he thought, _it looks like I'll have to break out the old Ferret Infiltration Technique. I haven't had to do that in a long time._ Now to stealthily stow away in the baggage section, if his amateur stealth was sufficient for the task.

* * *

 **This has been Chapter Three. I'll post the next in a few days. Please share if you liked it and review whether you did or not. A shout-out to the two brave souls who reviewed the first chapter; your interest and feedback are highly instrumental in keeping me motivated. Thank you!**


	4. Chapter 4: Coastal Airport 8

Chapter 4: Coastal Airport 8

Brigitte was nervous. It wasn't something she was used to-most of her projects involved constant work and action rather than waiting. On the plane to the coast, she had a few hours with nothing to do. She had reviewed all the appropriated documents from the Infinity Library, and while Dr. Scaglietti had sent Cinque along as her escort, the other girl wasn't very talkative.

It was hard to find topics for conversation, as well. She had little in common with any of the Numbers, for a variety of reasons. Most of what she knew, she would prefer to keep hidden from Scaglietti's group. Thus, the first hour passed in silence.

At that point, Brigitte was ready to give up on stoicism and let out a deep sigh. Cinque's uncovered eye flickered to her, but the other girl said nothing.

"What's it like having sisters?" asked Brigitte. Cinque looked at her with mild surprise. At least, that's what Brigitte assumed it was. The cyborgs were really hard to read.

"Why do you ask?" Cinque replied.

"It's..." Brigitte searched for words. "I'm curious. I never had any siblings. I can guess from how I've seen you interact, but I can't really tell what any of you are thinking. Your training's pretty good."

"Hm." Cinque looked out the window.

"It's okay if you don't want to answer! I just...wanted to ask."

Cinque turned her gaze back to Brigitte. "Please be more discreet with your questions in the future. A mission is not the proper time for such discussions."

"I know." Brigitte grimaced. "I can't really talk to any of you while the Doctor is around. He seems friendly, but he listens and picks apart everything you say until he thinks he has you figured out...and I'm not comfortable with that. It's different for you. He's been there for your whole lives, and as long as you do what he wants, he doesn't care about all the details." Brigitte squirmed in her seat, pushing up against the headrest. She glanced at Cinque, but the cyborg was sitting quietly with no sign of having listened. Brigitte slouched forward and let her head rest on her hands.

"You're lonely," said Cinque. Brigitte looked up, startled. "That is why you asked, right?"

Brigitte turned away, not wanting to let the Number see her face.

"Unconditional trust."

Brigitte started. "Eh?"

"That is what sisterhood is to me." Cinque sounded resigned, but to what, Brigitte couldn't tell. "Having someone who will always be there to support you, and whom you support in turn...someone to trust with your life. That is how I feel about my sisters."

Brigitte twisted sideways in her seat and curled her legs under her. "I wish I had someone like that."

Neither spoke again for the rest of the flight.

* * *

They arrived at Coastal Airport 8 precisely on schedule, give or take half a minute. As they walked through the arrival gate, Cinque asked, "Do you have the transfer coordinates for your rendezvous?" Brigitte nodded. "Good. Best of luck on your mission. If you'll excuse me, I have luggage of my own to collect." Cinque's expression softened a little. "Be careful, and do your best, Miss Vert."

"Ah, you too. Thank you." Brigitte watched Cinque slip away into the crowd, then made her way to an empty row of waiting seats. She climbed atop one and scanned the crowd for the librarian. Where was-

-he was right behind her, wasn't he. She snuck a glance over her shoulder, but nobody was there and then oh he was right in front of her. "Will you stop just appearing next to me?" she hissed.

He frowned. "I've been standing in plain sight since you came out. Have you considered that you might be a little less conscious of your surroundings than you think?"

Brigitte took a deep breath and forced herself to ignore the bait. She would make up for this in their next teleport chase. He couldn't possibly be prepared for her special technique, the fake-out teleport! Well, okay, he could be, but the probability was low. He'd never seen it used until she developed it at the age of eight. At this point in the timeline, it was still her trump card. Wait, did that mean she shouldn't use it?

The librarian raised an eyebrow. "Do you have a reason to keep standing on that chair?"

Brigitte hopped off with the best indignance she could muster and crossed her arms, staring up at him. "How did you get here before me?"

"I rode in the luggage compartment as a stealth exercise."

"Right," she grumbled. "Transformation. Dumb question." He shot her a questioning look, but she grabbed his arm and began to pull him along toward a less crowded area. [Come on. We should go somewhere a little less public for our teleport out of here,] she sent telepathically.

The librarian twisted his hand out of her grasp but seemed content to follow where she led. His gaze would scan the crowd every so often, likely watching for his friends. Acceptably efficient. It would be a hassle if he were spotted.

When had she started to accept his presence on her mission?

Brigitte bumped into something and stumbled back, rubbing her forehead. The indigo-haired girl in front of her mirrored the action. "Ow! Oh, sorry. I didn't watch where I was going." The girl made a quick bow of apology. "I'm looking for my sister. Have you seen her?"

"No, sorry. We're in a bit of a hurry. Shouldn't you go ask at the customer assistance desk? That would be better than looking on your own."

"Okay, I'm off! Thank you!" The girl dashed away through the thinning crowd.

Brigitte turned to find Yuuno frowning. "What?" she asked. "She's the same age as me. She should be able to figure this out without my help."

Yuuno shook his head. "Not that. You could have told her which direction to go. She'll miss the closest help station."

"Well, it's hard to be polite when you just got whacked in the head!" Brigitte snapped. She rubbed her forehead some more. "Darn, that girl has a hard head. Come on, we're almost there."

[Where will this teleport take us?] Yuuno asked, following her as she resumed walking.

[...A courier vessel in orbit. We're heading to Avenata.]

[Aligned World 31? I can't say I know much about the place.]

[I grew up there,] said Brigitte.

[Ah. I see.]

Brigitte gave him a meaningful glare. [Oh, and since we didn't arrange for multiple passengers, you'll have to use your transformation to pass as my familiar.] She met his grimace with a grin. [I heard you're especially adept with that.]

[How do you know about that?]

Her grin widened. [There are a few inactive terminals over on this end of the airport. We can make our teleport from there without drawing attention.]

[Who told you about my transformation?]

She tossed her head, whipping her ponytail over her shoulder. [Can't tell you. It's a secret!]

He frowned at her. [You won't be able to keep your secrets forever. Not if you want me to help you at all.]

[Hmph. Why would I want _your_ help?]

The librarian looked at her but said nothing. Brigitte broke eye contact and glared fiercely at a nearby bathroom sign. "Go in there and change," she spat. "I'll wait."

He sighed. "If you insist."


	5. Chapter 5: Fire

Chapter 5: Fire

"Okay, thank you for waiting. How may I help you?"

An indigo-haired girl stepped up to the counter. "Um, could you please call a lost child for me?"

The attendant nodded. "Certainly. Could you tell me your full name, and then your departure time and destination?"

"Okay. We're traveling to Alucia in Western-Mid. I'm Ginga Nakajima, and the one missing is my little sister. She must have wondered off on her own. Her name is Subaru, and she's eleven years old."

* * *

Cinque was halfway to the meeting point for the cargo transfer when she realized something was wrong. She ducked into a side corridor and opened her secure comm link to Quattro. [Something's gone wrong. I'm detecting activity from the Relic in storage. Why aren't you taking care of it?]

A sheepish giggle came in reply. [Sorry, I've been watching Miss Vert and the librarian. It seems that she's actually allowing him to accompany her! They're about to teleport out; I'll be there in a minute.]

Cinque frowned slightly. [Quattro,] she said calmly, [that is not our mission any more. The Relic takes priority for now. You are far better adapted for sneaking into the storage area to reseal the artifact than I.]

[Aw, but this is interesting!] Quattro pouted. [Besides, if we needed to get into storage, why didn't we bring Sein?]

Cinque paused. It was a valid point. However, it was irrelevant, as Sein was unavailable at the moment. [I'll head there now. Hopefully, it's nothing.]

A warning beeped in her eye's HUD.

Extreme mana concentration.

Already? There should be no reason for it to activate, unless it was unstable to begin with. Cinque broke into a run. If the Relic was activating, any magical devices stored near it were in danger of going out of control. Out-of-control magic meant explosions. Dimensional ripples that any nearby mage would sense. Discovery by the authorities.

Mission failure.

The emissions grew more dense, too strong for her eye's sensors to handle. Ignoring the warnings, Cinque increased her pace and slammed into the door to the storage room, bursting the lock and denting the door. She stumbled through with her remaining momentum. Her sensors screamed at the blinding mana that saturated every corner of the room.

It appeared that she was a few seconds too late.

...

Cinque's eye snapped open. Quattro was shaking her. A 12.73-second gap in sensory data. Translation: 12.73 seconds spent unconscious. As Cinque stirred, Quattro gave a relieved gasp and slid back to give her room to get up.

Minor surface injuries. Optical sensors slightly damaged-no, recalibrating from overload. Full mobility retained. Shell Coat had absorbed most of the blast, fortunately. Cinque overrode her body s automatic painkillers before they activated. This pain was bearable.

She sat up, accepting Quattro's helping hand and ignoring her tortured ribs. The Relic lay in the melted remains of its containment unit. The area immediately around it was slagged, and what wasn't slagged was burning. Gritting her teeth, she stood. "Quattro, help me seal it. Our containment systems are clearly insufficient."

The two cyborgs flanked the melted hole in the floor and concentrated. The blocky script of IS Template formulas flashed and spun in yellow and yellow-green circles around their outstretched left hands. Both fired a thin beam of energy at the Lost Logia, burning against its glow and finally suppressing it altogether. The Relic sealed, Cinque knelt and cast three concentric barrier spheres around it, contracting them as much as possible. She glanced up at Quattro. "Do you have the backup containment unit?"

"Yup! Here it is." Quattro pulled the item from beneath her cape and gently slid the sealed Relic inside."

Cinque paused to reevaluate her injuries. Still nothing serious. Good. "Quattro, will you be able to properly cloak our escape?"

Quattro grinned. "Don't worry. I hid some incendiary bombs in the other side of the terminal as a distraction and set them off as soon as I heard the explosion. It'll give us enough time to get out before rescue teams arrive."

Cinque coughed at a spike of pain in her lungs. "When did..."

"Right when I got here. It was a piece of cake! Lucky thing I had them, right?"

"Quattro, let's leave. And...in the future, tell me before you do something like that."

Quattro looked stricken. "Was it bad that I did that?"

Cinque hesitated. "No," she said. "Just ask for permission before you act on your own. It will help keep all of us alive."

"Okay!" Quattro was back to her chipper self. "Come on. I'll get us out of here. This way!"

* * *

Looking back, Subaru should have asked for directions. She would have gone to the help desk, but she didn't know where to look.

The wall exploded.

She yelped and tried to throw herself out of the way, but she was too slow; the blast caught her, hurling her into the opposite wall and showering her face with sparks. She held up her sleeves to block the heat from her face. Her skirt was too short to cover her legs. Something was burning, spreading smoke, and the heat grew more and more painful every second. Subaru tried to move, but her legs wouldn't budge. She could only crawl, pulling herself away from the awful heat with her arms. The long sleeves of her sister s hand-me-down shirt were scorched. Where was Ginga? Why wasn't anyone around? Was there nobody to help her?

"Someone, help me! Please!" she screamed.

* * *

Nanoha sped through the air toward the flaming airport. Honestly. Couldn't the universe have a better hobby than getting in the way of her time with her friends?

It was a selfish though, but better to have it now than in a few moments, when focus would be needed.

 **"Master, incoming communication from Inspector Yagami."**

Thank you, Raising Heart. Put her on.

 _"Nanoha! I m glad you re here. There are still people trapped inside that our ground crews can t get near. Can I rely on you and Fate for this?"  
_

"Of course. Just tell me where to go."

 _"I'll link you to our controller. He'll give you directions. Over and out."  
_

Raising Heart blinked, relaying the new information. Nanoha skimmed through it. "Raising Heart, give me locations, starting from highest priority. People are depending on us."

 **"Yes, my master."**

Fortunately, the numbers were smaller than Nanoha had expected. The initial evacuations must have been successful. She dove for the airport roof, her Barrier Jacket parting the flames before her. A quick burst of pink broke through the roof, letting her swoop inside.

She could feel the heat leaking in through her Barrier Jacket as she sped toward her first target. Here and there, a pile of rubble or a collapsed ceiling would block her path, but she simply blasted through them. Time was of the essence.

There! A young girl lay on the ground near a gaping, blackened hole in the wall through which fire roared. Nanoha touched down next to her and cast an area protection spell. The heat let up and the girl stirred.

"Don't worry," said Nanoha. "I'm here to help. Can you get up on your own?"

The girl began to push herself up on her arms, trembling. "My...my legs won t move. Please..." Her legs were red and chafed, but they only held a few burns. _Paralysis from the shock?_ thought Nanoha.

She grasped the girl under the armpits and set her on her knees. "Here. Grab onto my back. I'll carry you out." She turned, and the girl obediently clasped her arms around Nanoha's neck, holding tightly. Nanoha dismissed her barrier and took off. "Hey, can you tell me your name? I want to let your family know that you're all right."

"Subaru Nakajima," murmured the girl. "Wait, my sister is here too! She'll be looking for me. Can you save her, please?"

"Don't worry," Nanoha said. "Everything is going to be all right. We'll definitely save both you and your sister. I promise."

* * *

Nanoha turned away from the gutted, smoking airport. The Ground Forces rescue teams, supported by the three Aces, had managed to suppress the fire without any loss of life. Still, she was troubled; the fire seemed to have originated in a storage area away from any of the building's main power systems, meaning that the cause could have been a planned detonation. This was supported by the several smaller explosions that occurred in other locations around the airport, but in the general devastation, searching for the remains of a bomb would take time, so they didn't have any leads yet.

Thus, Nanoha was wandering among the various rescuees, asking questions and gathering evidence. Next on her list was...Subaru Nakajima, the girl she d rescued, and her sister, Ginga.

"Hello, Subaru. I'm Nanoha Takamachi, Second Lieutenant with the TSAB Air Force. It's nice to meet you." Nanoha smiled at the girl, who stared at her with eyes of undisguised admiration. "Can I ask you some questions about what you remember? It's important for our investigation that we figure out just what happened here."

Subaru's eyes widened, but she nodded quickly in an attempt to regain her composure. "Um, sure! Whatever you need!"

Nanoha smiled again. "Well, when I found you, you were pretty close to the source of the fire on that wing. Do you remember seeing anyone suspicious while you were in the airport?"

"I don't think so? The only people I talked to were this girl and her older brother. At least, I think he was her brother, cuz they had the same color hair, and me and Ginga have the same hair, and we're sisters, so he was probably her brother." Subaru nodded, satisfied with her reasoning. Then she frowned. "Well, I didn't _actually_ talk to both of them. I kinda ran into the girl and knocked her on the head, and then I asked her if she'd seen Sis, but she said I should go check at the help desk, and I ran off without asking for directions, and then the wall blew up, and that's everything I can remember. Did you see anything, Sis?"

"No?" Ginga paused to think. "No, I was too busy looking for you after we got separated. I only talked to the airport personnel." Of the two, Ginga looked more visibly shaken.

"I see," said Nanoha. "Thank you, Subaru, Ginga." She stood up. "I have to get back to my comrades now. There's quite a bit to do before we can consider this incident resolved. It was nice meeting you, though!"

* * *

Light footsteps announced Nanoha's return. "Found anything yet?"

Fate shook her head. "No, none of the people I questioned had seen anything suspicious. You?"

"Sorry, it's the same for me." Nanoha smiled apologetically.

Hayate landed next to them, her Barrier Jacket's skirt ruffling in the night breeze. "I just got word from our sensor teams. They only had a passive scan running before the fire broke out, but they were able to detect magical activity in the area. The first was a long-range teleport aimed into planetary orbit. The second...well, I had to have Rein confirm the data, but it was that Lost Logia we had to recover for our last mission-one of the Relics . The main blast had that magic signature we sensed, but none of the secondary blasts did. They must have been simple explosives."

"I see," said Fate. "Do you think the is the work of the same group that opposed us then? Perhaps that teleport was meant as a distraction."

Hayate nodded. "I thought so too, but that's too sloppy. The Relic wouldn't have been destroyed in the explosion, and whoever set this up should know we know that, especially since its energy disappeared so quickly, as if it had been sealed."

"The teleport is still suspicious," Nanoha said. "No matter how you look at it, it would be a distraction, right? If it happened before the Relic was sealed, then it couldn't have been the perpetrators escape route."

"But that leaves us back where we started," noted Fate. "We still don't have any reliable leads."

Hayate sighed. "I guess we'll have to pass this case on to Chrono and Inspector Acous, then? There's not much else we can do here. Even if we tried to follow the teleport, their ship is probably long gone. There s nothing to do but finish taking care of this situation. Ugh, this is going to be a lot of paperwork."

* * *

 **Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, my readers! Chapter 4 was short, so I decided to post two at once. Thank me by leaving a review. Faves and follows work, too.**


	6. Chapter 6: To Avenata

Chapter 6: To Avenata

The sparkling haze around Brigitte cleared, signifying the end of the teleport. She found herself in a small chamber, facing an open doorway.

"Come on out," a rough voice called. "Don't hang back; you're already here."

Cautiously, Brigitte walked through the doorway and glanced around the area. The large bay doors and the escape pods mounted on the wall made this...a docking bay? That sounded right, but Brigitte had never bothered to study ship architecture. Yet another subject to add to the list.

A gaunt, sunken-eyed man and a woman, silver-haired and solidly built, watched her expectantly from the center of the room. Brigitte cleared her throat and gave a slight bow. "Right, my introduction. I am Brigitte Vert, and Doc-the doctor told me that this ship would take me to Avenata."

The woman squinted. "Hmm. Girl of eleven, green eyes...yeah, that's good enough. You're on the right ship, kid." The rough voice was hers.

The man stroked a wispy goatee. "You don't look quite as I had imagined you, but that's to be expected. The doctor only gave us a name and basic description." He stepped forward and offered her a hand. "Welcome aboard the _Contractor_." Brigitte shook his hand. His grip was firm, but awkwardly situated. He quirked an eyebrow. "Ah, you noticed. I'm left-handed, you see. I've had to teach myself to offer my right hand first, but it's never as comfortable as I would like."

The woman scowled at him. "Oy, Cobalt. Stop rambling and let her go already." She jerked her head toward the hallway. "This way, girl. We got a room for you."

"Ah, thank you," murmured Brigitte. She moved to follow the woman, but flinched as the man-Cobalt-touched her shoulder.

"Is that a ferret? Uncommon in these parts, as I remember. Is it your pet...or a familiar?"

Brigitte glared at him. "What's it to you?"

He stepped back, raising his hands. "Did I touch a nerve? I was merely curious. The doctor rarely gives us details on jobs involving people. Something about wanting to avoid confirmation bias on his psychological profiles. Either way, it shouldn't matter as long as the both of you are well-behaved."

Yuuno, in his ferret form, uncurled himself from her shoulder. He fixed Cobalt with a stare, and said, "We'll behave. As for your questions, you seem like an educated man. Form your own conclusions."

Cobalt grinned. "Oh, I like you already." He rubbed his hands together. "I'm sure we'll find time to talk over the next few days. Let's get along, shall we?"

Brigitte nodded slowly and turned again to follow the woman. They walked through the hallway, leaving Cobalt behind. A few hundred feet down, the woman stopped and tapped the control panel of a door that looked just like all the other doors. It slid open and she motioned inside. "This'll be your room. 'S a converted cargo bay, so you can sleep here, do whatever. Long as it don't make a mess, we won't ask any questions. I'll bring you food at mealtimes, 'less you _want_ to sit with Astrus."

"Who?" asked Brigitte.

"Cobalt. That's his name, Astrus Cobalt. Well, you let me know. The bridge is on the other end of this hallway, and you can sit there if you're quiet and got nothin' else to do. I'll introduce you to the captain if you do. Just don't poke around in the other cargo holds. You don't ask, we don't ask. Capiche?"

Brigitte blinked at the unfamiliar word and nodded hurriedly. "Right."

The woman nodded approvingly. "Good. Your door's unlocked. The trip's only thirty-eight hours, so you shouldn't get too bored." She turned to leave.

"Excuse me," said Brigitte. "I didn't get your name."

"Didn't give it, did I? Paula Chevron. Just call me Chevron. It's easier." She walked out, and the door slid shut behind her.

Yuuno hopped off Brigitte's shoulder to the floor and inspected the bunk set in the wall. "This seems to be a decent setup." [Use telepathy for private conversations. They may be recording us.]

"I'm sure they've taken passengers before," Brigitte replied. [Do you want me to scan for recording devices?]

[Not unless you can do it without them noticing.] Yuuno paused. [You didn't arrange this trip yourself. How much do you trust your middleman, this 'doctor'?]

Brigitte shrugged. [I don't. He doesn't deserve it.]

[Yet you relied on him to obtain transportation. And considering the roundabout path we took to board this ship, these people are likely smugglers of some kind.]

[It was my best option, okay? These people aren't going to care that I'm not a Bureau citizen. I give the doctor something interesting, he pays the smugglers as a favor, we treat it like a business transaction, and that's the end of it.]

[You're not a Bureau citizen?]

Brigitte suppressed a snort. [Are you kidding? Why else would I be jumping through all these hoops to get around? The Bureau can't help me. My home planet isn't an Administered world.]

Yuuno hopped onto the bunk. [Then, would I be correct in assuming that Avenata is your home planet?]

Brigitte sat down next to him. [Yeah. It's nice enough, depending on where you live.]

[Mm. I suppose this begs the question of how you got to Midchilda, but that would be another classified subject, wouldn't it?]

She gave a slight nod. [Definitely confidential. Huh. You know, maybe I should just tell you what I have to keep secret now, so you'll know what you can ask about.]

[That would be logical and efficient, yes.]

Brigitte rolled her eyes. [Sure. Well, the short list is my family, my Device, my childhood, the doctor, how I got to Mid, and how I found out about the thing we're going to destroy. Anything else should be fair game, within reason.]

Yuuno stretched out on the bunk and twisted his neck to look at her. [So, no asking who trained you in magic, or whether the doctor is your father.]

Brigitte shuddered. [Absolutely not, and also, blech.]

[...To the first, or to the second?]

Brigitte snorted. [You seem like a capable, educated man. Form your own conclusions.]

Yuuno chuckled. [My own words used against me. Is that common for kids your age? My experience of eleven-year-olds is not exactly representative of the general population.]

[And you ask the girl on an interplanetary misadventure about what's normal? Sheesh. You'd have better luck getting married and having kids of your own. At least, I've been told you don't really understand children until you've had to raise one. I wouldn't know, obviously.]

[I should hope not.]

Brigitte smirked. [Yeah, I'm saving boys until after puberty, thank you very much.]

[What resolve,] Yuuno drawled. [Surely, your father must be very proud of you, to have forsworn romantic entanglements at your tender age.]

Brigitte groaned aloud. "Ugh. Could you be _more_ annoying about it?" She flopped onto her back and stretched across the bunk. [Now, relevant questions. I'm sure you have them.]

Yuuno shifted his position to make room for her legs. [If you insist. Why don't you start with your name and your goals for this mission? I've been referring to you mentally as 'that girl', and it feels rather awkward.]

Brigitte frowned. [Huh. We did not, in fact, have an introduction. Easily remedied. I'm Brigitte Vert of Avenata.]

[Yuuno Scrya of the Scrya, but you knew that already. Apparently.]

[Anyway...goals.] Brigitte scrunched her eyes shut as she put her words together. [Let's see...Avenata, right. So, there's a thing in this guy's backyard.]

[A thing.]

[I'm getting there! Don't interrupt. Anyway, it's the prototype for a quaternionic orthodimensional navigation system. It uses a mass drive to compensate for things that standard dimensional drives can't do. The problem is that it kinda tears up space when it's used-not in a dimensional quake sort of way, but in a localized dimensional rift sort of way. It's fine for the guy using it, but it's bad for everyone else. Are you following me so far?]

Yuuno looked at her with his too-large-for-a-ferret's eyes. [I have many questions, but they can wait until you finish.]

Brigitte nodded. [Sure. Anyway, the guy, Henri Durand, is a researcher specializing in dimensional manipulation.]

[I read a paper of his on Imaginary Space. Highly theoretical, but well thought-out. So he lives on Avenata?]

[Right. He also does part-time excavations of some ruins near where he lives. They might be a holdover from Al-Hazard, but nobody's sure. The style doesn't quite match what we've seen elsewhere. Anyway, the doohickus is somewhere in those ruins, and my job is to find and dispose of it before Mr. Durand finds it and publishes all the schematics like the good scientist he is.] Brigitte snapped her fingers as another thought struck her. [By the way, that's why I was researching the Arc-en-ciel. I thought I should familiarize myself with destructive dimensional distortions, just in case.]

The disguised librarian was silent. Finally, he said, [Why didn't you come to me in the first place? Even if your information couldn't be verified, I would have listened to you, at least.]

Something constricted inside Brigitte's chest. [I...I can't. I promised.] Silently, she added, _I'm sorry._

Neither spoke for a long time. Brigitte glanced at the ferret, who seemed to have dozed off. _Honestly, the things I put up with._ She swung her legs off the bunk, stood up, and stretched her arms above her head. She glanced at Yuuno again, and said, "Well, I'm going to sit on the bridge, I guess. I'll see you when I get back." She tapped the door's control panel to open it.

[I'll help you, for now.]

She paused in the open doorway. Naturally, he was pretending to be asleep.

[Whether I continue to is dependent on the conclusions I draw for myself once we reach the site. Be prepared for that.]

"I'd be disappointed if you didn't," she mumbled as she left, too low for him to hear.

* * *

Astrus Cobalt sauntered onto the ship's bridge. It was a compact affair, but not cramped. Taking care not to acknowledge the helmsman, he walked up to the bridge's single front-facing window. To either side, the status of the ship and its cargo were represented on various displays, but the window itself was unenhanced. Unobstructed. The interface was his design, born from his preference for unassisted vision. It might be less instructive than the ship's sensor suite, but it made him feel more secure. His comrades dealt with it as merely another of his eccentricities.

He deigned to notice the helmsman. "Polonez, status."

"We are entering into our route through the dimensional sea. All systems green."

Astrus nodded. "Thank you, Polonez."

The seated man frowned. "Do not patronize me. You are not the captain."

Astrus laughed. "I won't quarrel with you on that, my friend." Polonez didn't respond, so he continued, "Doctor Scaglietti sent us a new girl this time. I don't think she's one of his, though."

The helmsman glanced up from the console but said nothing.

Astrus knew he had caught the man's interest, if briefly. "Much less flamboyantly dressed, for one. Absolutely scathing conversationalist, too; she and her familiar both."

"We were not informed of a familiar," mumbled Polonez.

Astrus smiled and began to pace around the bridge. "Does this honestly surprise you? You know as well as I do how much the doctor enjoys his blind case studies."

"And we only continue to work with his group because of your...predilection for variables," Polonez growled.

"Variety is the spice of life, my man," said Astrus, still pacing, "and mine would be a life of boredom without the occasional challenge. What need is there for a strategist when no improvisation is required?"

"Then you chose the wrong trade for your skills."

"And you would prefer to work without me?"

Someone cleared her throat at the doorway. Astrus and Polonez looked over to see their young passenger poking her head through, eyes seeming to ask, Is this a bad time?

Polonez grunted and got up from the console. "I'll leave it to you." He strode out through the opposite doorway, followed by the clump of his heavy boots.

Almost timidly, the girl slid into the room, hugging the wall. "Does he not like you much?" she asked.

Astrus plopped into Polonez's vacated chair. "That's his business, Miss Vert. It's not my job to be liked."

"Does _anyone_ like you?"

He palmed his chin and stroked his goatee contemplatively. "Do they, indeed? I'm afraid I'm not privy to the inner thoughts of most. No effusive admirers, certainly. I get a lot of quiet toleration, thought. Those are always the boring ones. Please, if you have 'beef' with me, come out with it. I do enjoy a good verbal spar."

"I'll...consider it," she said. She sat down on the floor, crossing her arms in front of her, and stared out the lone window into the rippling haze that was the dimensional sea.

* * *

 **One interlude and one chapter left before we're caught up with what I've already written. As always, I want to hear from you. Feedback is quite literally the life of this business.**


	7. Chapter 7: A Dusty City

Chapter 7: A Dusty City

The two-day trip to Avenata passed rather uneventfully. The only member of the crew who made an effort to interact with Brigitte and Yuuno was Astrus, who showered her with questions like, "Are you an Avenatan native? You have the right sort of name and complexion," and "How did you train your familiar to speak in animal form without telepathy?" After multiple attempts at prying into her personal life and equipment, Brigitte took to staying in her room to avoid him. From what she could see, his crewmates didn't like him much, though they deferred to him. Paula only appeared at mealtimes, and Polonez kept the helm silently. Of the ship's captain, there was no sign at all.

Yuuno had requested access to her borrowed reference materials within the first few hours of the trip. She allowed it, not having a reason to deny him. They spoke little to each other, she reviewing her plans and cross-checking them with her sources, he comparing the content of the documents to that of his memories. He would pause only to ask for particulars of Avenatan culture and archaeological history, of which she presumably knew more. The distance between them grated on her nerves, but it was her decision to limit the information she gave him. Yuuno's company was preferable to that of the _Contractor_ 's crew, but it didn't quite keep her from feeling lonely.

The two had but one conversation of note, on the evening of the second day. They were to land at their destination the next morning, and Yuuno's question took her by surprise.

[Have you met Henri Durand?]

She blinked. [Uh...I lived in the same district, but we haven't met yet.] She frowned. [What brought this on?]

[Well, you're dealing with the man's excavation site. Don't you think it would be basic courtesy to say hello and ask him to show us around?]

[Yeah...] She trailed off.

[I had expected you to bring this up already,] he said. [You _were_ planning to get his approval to examine the site, were you not?]

[What? I mean, obviously! I was going to bring it up eventually. Just because I didn't do it with you doesn't mean I was planning to jump in without preparation.] She glared at him, daring him to contradict her. He chose not to press the matter and returned to his reading.

Neither spoke to the other until the time came to disembark the following morning. The ship docked at a small, clean airport with an air of legitimacy. Astrus ushered Brigitte off the ship with his usual smile. The more Brigitte saw it, the more awkward and sickly it seemed. She was restless, and the man annoyed her, but she forced her disgust down with some effort. Father was always polite, regardless of desert, and she might need to book a spot on the _Contractor_ again.

Yuuno shifted on her shoulder, looking around the docking area. Only a few people were to be seen.

"Not many up and about, as you can see. It's only half an hour past dawn, local time. That's about six of twenty-eight Mid standard hours, accounting for the longer planetary rotation here. But I'm sure you studied up before coming home, didn't you? No need for my little reminders."

Brigitte forced herself not to glare at Astrus for interrupting her first breath of non-recycled air in forty-three Mid standard hours. Instead, she turned to him and said, "I'll thank you for you escort and your hospitality, Mr. Cobalt, if not your conversation. Our contract is here fulfilled, and I shall take my leave. Goodbye."

He smirked, the motion twisting his eyebrows into an odd shape. "Charming as ever, Miss Vert. If you ever require our services, please leave a message by the travel agency. It's on your right as you exit. We have a respectable clientele in this city, if you'll believe it."

Brigitte found the contract between his unkempt face and his earnest words rather ridiculous, but she only nodded, spun on her heel, and left the area without another word through the door he had advertised.

She turned left, making for the outside street. It was a short walk, but Brigitte was glad for the exercise. As she pushed open the glass double doors and stepped into Avenata's pale morning sunshine, Yuuno shifted on her shoulder. "You really don't like him, do you."

"I am celebrating the riddance of a man more annoying than you," she hissed. "Please, don't ruin this for me."

"Sometimes, I think that you don't talk like an eleven-year-old," he sighed.

She rolled her eyes. "Oh, really? I don't have many others to compare myself to. Perhaps you could introduce me to some?"

He shook himself and flopped prone on her shoulder. "Never mind."

* * *

At the first intersection of the street with another, Brigitte turned to a descending staircase built into the street corner and hopped down, two steps at a time. The staircase came down to an underground platform adjacent to a tunnel. Both were lit with dim yellow lights from the ceiling. A short row of turnstiles stood between the landing of the staircase and the platform proper. Brigitte shook the shoulder Yuuno was sitting on. "You might as well turn back now. Nobody's here because it's so early, but there might be people on the train."

Yuuno obliged, hopping off her shoulder and transforming into his human form. He swung his shoulders to loosen the muscles. "An underground train, then? I've heard of something similar on UA-97, but I always flew or teleported there. I didn't expect to see one here."

Brigitte rolled her eyes. "Sure, we don't have a lot of magical infrastructure, but what we do have is efficient. Even if Avenata's a backwater compared to Midchilda, Lascaux is still a well-developed city." She tapped her bracelet and retrieved several coins from Calliope's dimensional storage. Skipping over to the ticket machine at the wall, she counted out the right amount for two tickets and returned the rest to storage. She glanced over her shoulder at Yuuno. "What, are you going to say something about how we still use physical currency?"

Yuuno shook his head. "No, I was just thinking that I don't get out enough. I haven't had to deal with currency for about two years."

Brigitte grabbed the tickets as the machine spat them out. "Wow, get a social life already."

Yuuno hummed and put a hand to his chin. "I've met four new people on this excursion, including yourself, so I would say that I'm taking steps to correct that deficiency, even if only one of the four promises to be more than a passing acquaintance."

"So you plan to be pals with that Cobalt guy?"

Yuuno raised an eyebrow. Brigitte flashed a completely innocent grin and handed him one of the tickets.

* * *

They found Dr. Durand's home address easily enough. His home, office, and laboratory rested all on the same lot near the outskirts of the city. The train only carried the two to where the suburbs just began, and Brigitte refused to pay for a taxi, so the two were faced with nearly an hour's walk along dusty sidewalks and increasingly brown surroundings. A patch of grass or a tree appeared here and there, though they were dry and desert-like.

Yuuno found himself glancing at the girl periodically, expecting her to complain about aching feet or the like, but Brigitte seemed resilient to the demands both of the road and of her stomach. On second thought, he was projecting; his physical condition was not the best, despite his recent training, and he knew nothing of Brigitte's normal eating habits. Also, undoing his transformation always made him hungrier.

"How much longer, do you think?" he asked.

"We'll get there when we get there," Brigitte answered. Her perfectly serene countenance was disturbed only by her muttering, "Oh, I've been waiting for a chance to use that one."

Yuuno frowned. "Please don't talk to me like I'm an impatient child."

Brigitte pouted. "When will I have another chance to say it?"

"Have you no children among your acquaintance?"

"Not really," Brigitte mumbled. Her face fell.

 _Ah,_ thought Yuuno, _I've touched a sore spot._ He wasn't ready to say that he knew her well after less than a week, but he seemed to flip her bad-mood switches a little too easily for comfort. She hadn't repeated the angry display from the airport, which was heartening. However, even coming close to the banned topics would cause her to clam up, and it worried him. _Emotional trauma, I suspect, almost certainly related to her family. I may have to get her to let it out for her own good...who am I kidding. I'm no therapist. If I were any good at this, I might have been able to talk Fate down during the Jewel Seed incident. Having Nanoha as my partner...I didn't deserve to be that lucky._

Brigitte was looking at him out of the corner of her eye and fidgeting with her bracelet. He hurriedly shifted his attention to her. "Yes? What is it?"

Still fidgeting, she mumbled, "Could you..." The rest was too low for him to hear.

"I'm sorry, could you say that again? I didn't quite catch it."

"Could...could you do the introductions when we arrive? It would seem strange for me to take the lead when you have seniority and an official position." Her ponytail bobbed behind her with the motion of her head.

Yuuno nodded. "Certainly, if it would make you more comfortable. What do you want me to say?"

"Just say..." Brigitte made a vacant gesture. "Just use the cover story about wanting to look into the ruins. Maybe bring up how much you like his papers on theoretical dimensional physics? And say I'm your distant relative, or something. It's normal for Scrya kids to go on official excavation trips at this age, right?"

Yuuno stopped walking and examined her with a more critical eye. It was true that she could pass for a relative. Her build was slender like his at that age, and she had the same green eyes, though her hair was darker than his by a few shades.

Brigitte kept going, turning her head to keep talking at him. "And it wouldn't technically be a lie, because I have some Scrya ancestry."

"Wait," he said. "Back up. You _what_?"

She stopped. "Scrya ancestry," she repeated. "On my dad's side. I wasn't trying to keep it a secret; you just didn't ask."

"After you specifically requested that I ask no questions about your family history," said Yuuno, an edge of disapproval slipping into his tone.

"Oh, right." She slapped her forehead. "Sorry, I'm not at my best right now. My critical thinking is less effective when I'm hungry."

"Ah, so I'm not the only one." Yuuno closed the distance and patted her on the shoulder. "That's good to know."

She rolled her eyes and resumed walking with him. "I hope we can get through the first introductions and have time left over for lunch. I bet you're the type to talk for hours and forget all about basic necessities."

Yuuno smiled. "I doubt that will be quite as much of a problem as you think, since I expect you to discuss things with us. You have a proper educational foundation, if the difficulty of those texts means anything."

Brigitte blinked in surprise. "Oh, uh, thanks." The corners of her mouth twitched upwards.

The rest of the walk passed quickly. Brigitte directed him past a rectangular building decked with an array of communication dishes to an older-looking, dusty house. The ground around the foundation held patches of windswept sand, but the porch and the first few feet of the walkway were neatly dusted off.

Yuuno knocked on the door three times, very precisely. Brigitte stood at the edge of the porch, swaying on her heels as she waited. A few seconds later, the sound of footsteps came from inside. Yuuno stepped back to allow a polite distance just before the door opened and a girl with reddish-brown hair poked her head outside.

"Ah, hello," Yuuno began. "We've come to see Dr. Henri Durand out of an interest in the archaeological site nearby. Would he be available to discuss some things?"

The girl quirked an eyebrow at him and opened the door a little more. She looked about sixteen and wore a plain, ankle-length dress with a green apron over it. "I'll let him know. May I ask who's calling, please?"

A light thud behind him showed that Brigitte had lost her balance and had to step down from the porch. Sparing a glance to make sure she was all right, he returned his attention to the young lady. "Yuuno Scrya, Infinity Librarian. That is, head researcher and archivist for the Infinity Library on Midchilda. Archaeology is really my first discipline, and I've read several of Dr. Durand's papers, so I thought I would like to pay a visit, you see."

The young woman tilted her head. "Interesting. You know, I almost expected you to be shorter, in person."

Yuuno raised a finger. "Um, what?"

The young woman laughed. "Oh, I'm sorry. Cousin Henri is quite a fan of your work, and he's shown me several things you've written. It's a bit above my comprehension level, but the parts I can understand are very clear and concise. I've seen you in pictures before, but most of them are from when you first received your position at nine years old. I'm sorry, this is turning into a monologue, and I haven't introduced myself. My name is Madeleine Vert; I'm Henri's cousin and acting housekeeper."

[Use Scrya for my family name. Please.] Brigitte's mental voice was tense. [It'll be much less awkward.]

Yuuno shook Madeleine's hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Vert. Ah, this is Brigitte. She's a relative of mine and very interested in visiting the Montignac ruins."

"So it's true that you all start that young," Madeleine mused.

Brigitte squinted with one eye. "I'm not a child."

Madeleine smiled. "My apologies. You're eleven, twelve? That's almost old enough for a weapon license here. Anyway, won't you come in? I'm sure Henri would be delighted to talk with you." She stepped back and opened the door the rest of the way. Yuuno and Brigitte followed her inside and wiped their shoes on the mat. "He won't have much time to show you around the excavation site, unfortunately," Madeleine continued. "He'll be busy writing research grant proposals for the next half a fortnight. If you'll wait here a moment, I'll tell him you're here." She scampered up a wooden staircase to the second floor, calling, "Cousin Henri! Cousin Henri!"

Yuuno watched her go. "She seems...nice, if excitable."

"Oh, you have no idea," Brigitte muttered.

"Pardon?"

"Nothing. I said nothing."


	8. Chapter 8: Archaeologist and Librarian

Chapter 8: An Archaeologist and a Librarian

Madeleine ushered Yuuno and Brigitte into the office on the house's upper floor. Henri Durand sat at a bulky wooden desk swamped with papers, with one corner cleared for several desk toys displaying mathematical forms and basic kinematics. The walls were mostly covered with bookshelves stuffed full, with the few remaining spaces holding enlarged pictures of what appeared to be the Lascaux excavation site. A small picture in a decorated frame leaned against the books on the shelf nearest to the desk, displaying Henri, a woman Yuuno didn't recognize, and a boy about two years old.

Brigitte was looking at the desk toys with a slight frown. When Yuuno raised an eyebrow at her, she quickly glanced in several other directions before settling on making eye contact with Dr. Durand, who smiled tiredly at them. "Please, have a seat," he said. "The deadline for these grants is in two days, so I don't have much time to spare. Regardless, it is a pleasure to meet you, Librarian Scrya."

Yuuno chuckled softly as he sat down. "Sorry, but it feels a little strange for a researcher twenty years my senior to address me by my official title. Could you call me Yuuno, or Mr. Scrya if you must?"

Dr. Durand smiled again. "Ah, that I can do. It would be rude of me not to reciprocate, so you may call me Henri. And your companion?"

"This is Brigitte," said Yuuno. "She's a relative of mine. I'm currently acting as her chaperone in preparation for her first solo expedition. She's quite excited to observe an ongoing excavation site in person, especially this one. It wasn't strictly necessary for me to accompany her, I suppose, but I also want to see Lascaux for myself. Also, I have to ensure that she returns my library materials on time."

Brigitte's sidelong glance seemed to say, _You didn't have to tell him about that!_

The weariness seemed to fall away from Henri's face. "Ah, an archaeologist in training! I would be honored to oblige you both. Lascaux is indeed a wondrous place. Had I known you were coming in advance, I could have already procured permits for you."

Yuuno nodded. "That would be another thing to note for the next time you schedule a trip on your own, Brigitte." To Durand, he said, "She arranged our travel plans herself without help. It's an important experience for her."

"Mm, entirely understandable." Henri shifted in his chair. "That said, do you have lodgings prepared?"

Yuuno looked at Brigitte. Brigitte looked off to the side, lips pursed. "In that case," continued Henri, "I can accommodate you both in the extra building that my brother uses when he's on leave from the planetary navy. His term of service has a few months left, and a more permanent solution can be found by then, if by chance you require one."

"That's...generous of you," said Brigitte, still looking mildly embarrassed. "If you don't mind, we'll accept that offer. Thank you very much."

Henri waved a hand. "Think nothing of it. An investment in a young mind is worth far more than a few weeks of lodging."

Brigitte seemed at a loss for words, so Yuuno said, "We're quite grateful for the assistance, Dr. Henri. Is there anything we could assist you with to lessen the burden, perhaps?"

"Oh, I can think of something," said Brigitte. "Why don't you help him with these documents for the grant proposals? This can't be a fast process. You can read up to three documents at a time without losing efficiency, right? And the faster he finishes, the sooner we an start and the less tired he'll be."

"Judging by the display from when we first met, you can do two yourself, at the least," Yuuno pointed out.

Brigitte crossed her arms. "Well, you're still better at it, and helping him out was your idea."

"Well, if you're that desperate for some time away from me, there's not much I can say in response." Yuuno turned to Henri. "Would you be able to use my help?"

Henri glanced over the swamp of papers, then back to Yuuno. "I suppose that your organizational skills are likely better than mine. Though I have to do all the writing myself, I'm sure that your help would be of some use."

Brigitte slid from her chair and stood up. "Then, if you don't mind..."

"Just don't go too far," said Yuuno, pulling his chair closer to the desk.

"Thanks," she said, and slipped out of the room.

* * *

Brigitte tromped down the staircase and moved into the kitchen area. Madeleine looked up from the stack of papers on the table in front of her. "Finished already?"

" _I_ am," said Brigitte. "Yuuno's helping Dr. Durand organize his papers. I'm sure they'll get sidetracked with some archeological thing or other, if not calculating a comparison between Imaginary Space and gravitational singularity, or something." She tilted her head. "Well, Yuuno can get sidetracked if the project isn't vitally important. I don't know about Dr. Durand, but I would assume he's the same based on his office."

Madeleine smiled and reshuffled her papers into a neat stack, tapping the side against the table. "You're not far off. Henri is fully capable of drifting into an hours-long lecture on the interpretation of an Al-Hazard cave painting during normal conversation. It's a shame he doesn't have a teaching position."

"He doesn't?"

"No, his research takes up most of his time. Right now, he's writing grant proposals, as I'm sure he told you, so his time to chat is limited. It's come to the point that I have to file the household taxes for him."

Brigitte peered at the stack of papers in Madeleine's hands. "Is that what those are? Is everything on paper here?"

Madeleine chuckled. "You would think we'd have moved to a computerized system by now, but the bureaucracy is hard to convince. I doubt switching over would make things faster for us, anyway."

"Huh." Brigitte leaned onto the back of one of the empty chairs. "So, this is unrelated, but doesn't Dr. Durand have a son?"

Madeleine brightened. "Oh, you want to meet Laurent? He should be up from his nap soon. That reminds me-it's almost time to start preparing dinner. Would you go up and ask Mr. Scrya if he'll stay for dinner? We would love to have you both."

Brigitte frowned, glancing at the ceiling. "I don't think he'll refuse. The good doctor offered to let us stay in the other house while we're here. Maybe going back up should wait until the food's ready. I doubt they're prepared for me to interrupt them just yet."

Madeleine laughed. "True, true." She pushed back her chair and walked over to the countertop, where she deposited the tax forms. "Well, I don't need to start immediately, so would you mind telling me a bit about yourself? Hobbies, experiences, favorite foods, and the like. It'll give us something to talk about over dinner."

Brigitte exhaled softly. Some of the tension in her frame bled away. "Yeah. I wouldn't mind that."

* * *

"...and so I wanted to do a project examining the Lascaux ruins. I find the whole area fascinating. There's still so little we know about it."

"I see, so that's why you're here," said Madeleine, nodding. "In that case, I'll have to take you on a tour tomorrow."

Brigitte tilted her head. "A tour?"

"Sure," said Madeleine, beaming. "I may not look it, but I specialize in local history. I even had a job as official tour guide for the place before Cousin Henri took over excavations. It's not open to the public right now, but as his assistant, I can get you in whenever you want. Working as Henri's housekeeper and secretary has its perks."

"Huh," said Brigitte, idly brushing away a few stray strands of hair. "I didn't know about that. I guess I should have assumed that academics would run in the family."

"Is it like that for your family?" asked Madeleine.

"Eh? Well, yeah. On both sides, actually. I didn't grow up in the clan proper, like my dad, but my mom is..." Brigitte fidgeted awkwardly. "Well, there's a reason she married him. They practically raised me on archaeology. Anyway, it took me a while, but I finally get to set my own goals for a project. I hadn't actually planned to bring Yuuno with me, but he's been useful enough that I'm torn between being glad he came anyway and being jealous of his superior experience."

Madeleine giggled. "A frank revelation of feelings? I haven't had to deal with that in a while. Henri tries, but he's too busy and too much older than me to be fun to talk to. Meanwhile, Laurent's too young for an equal conversation. This is really refreshing."

"You...don't have friends your age?" Brigitte asked.

"Well..." Madeleine paused. "I do, but we haven't spent much time together since we graduated from school three years ago. Henri's wife had died not long before, so I came to be his housekeeper and help raise Laurent as early as I could. I don't regret it, mind you, but...I think it forced me to grow up a little sooner than I wanted to."

Brigitte nodded. "My circumstances weren't-aren't-quite like that, but I can sympathize on the growing up too fast part. I like to think I hide it well."

"You act just as I would expect from an eleven-year-old girl," said Madeleine, smiling.

"...Thanks," replied Brigitte, and found that she meant it.

* * *

Astrus Cobalt strode through the _Contractor_ 's halls toward the captain's quarters. The urge to whistle came upon him, but he ignored it on the grounds that he could not, in fact, whistle. Humming was out as well. Under his breath, it was unenjoyable; aloud, and his shipmates would complain. He settled for snapping his fingers the rest of the way.

The door slid open before him, and he entered. The captain sat in a throne-like chair, gazing through the viewport into the starry void. Several IV needles protruded from his left arm above the heavy gauntlet he wore. His head turned slowly at the sound of Astrus's footsteps.

"Captain Corolla. The girl has been safely delivered," said Astrus, standing with arms clasped behind his back. "She's made no effort to conceal her movements, so tracking her to set up surveillance checkpoints was easy. While it is possible that she expects to be observed, I don't see the need to be invasive. I've also adjusted our maintenance schedule so that we can remain in the area for the next week before taking on another job. After that, Doctor Scaglietti can continue the observation with his own assets."

Corolla inclined his head in a jerky nod but said nothing.

"The doctor's interest does not ensure that her actions can be profited from...but the compensation is sufficient for the child-minding. And if we see something interesting...well, how we deal with it is entirely up to our discretion." Astrus met the captain's sidelong gaze. "Have you anything to add, brave leader?"

Corolla spoke at last, his voice harsh from unuse. "Do as...you see fit." His right hand gripped the arm of his chair, white-knuckled and trembling slightly.

Astrus gave a smile that did not reach his eyes. "Your confidence in my judgement is greatly appreciated." He spun on his heel and strode out of the room.

As the door closed behind him, Astrus exhaled. Speaking to Corolla took more effort than he liked to admit. It was...tiresome, to give status reports to a man doped up on painkillers to suppress his infection. A pity, as well; before the accident, the captain had been strong in both body and mind, easily surpassing Astrus in the former and almost matching him in the latter.

"You gonna jus' stand there, or what?"

Astrus blinked. Ah, it was Paula. He'd spaced out in the middle of the hallway. "This is a public area," he said, slipping on a halfhearted mask of politeness. "I am free to stand here lost in thought whenever I choose." A perfectly calculated response. His brain did good work.

She scoffed. "Don't give me that business. It wasn't funny the first time." She looked down the hall at the door to Corolla's quarters. "How's he doing?"

"What do you want me to say?" Astrus shrugged. "No outbursts, no injuries or malfunctions...I have nothing to tell you but negatives. Anything else, you can guess for yourself."

She gave him a cold stare, and he returned it without blinking. Finally, she spun her head away. "I'm going back to the maintenance checks. You gonna help?"

"Would my presence improve your mood?"

She grunted and turned away. Astrus watched her stride off, her hands clenched into fists.

He knew that none of his crewmates liked his personality. His eccentricity and lack of restraint were off-putting, and if he were honest, somewhat intentional. Yet, at moments like this, he couldn't help but feel a smug sense of satisfaction.

The _Contractor_ 's crew needed his intellectual skills, and he had Corolla's condition to thank for it.

* * *

 **Thank you for reading. Please review and share with people you think will like it. I wouldn't mind seeing some follows on this, either.**

 **Also, I apologize if the slow pace is turning some of you off. It will not remain so; the next chapter gets us into the next stage of the plot, and even has a character-establishing flashback, which I've already written. Look forward to it!**


	9. Interlude: Chrono's Day Off

Interlude: Chrono's Day Off

 _[...I think she's willing to trust me to help her, if she's telling the truth about the legitimacy of her project. She hasn't told me the details yet, but I don't think she's lying. She isn't difficult to read.]_

Chrono took a deep breath. This was his third time listening to Scrya's message, and it didn't help his opinion of Scrya's prudence any more than the first two. On the one hand, it meant something if the girl was easy for /him/ to read. On the other hand, Scrya had no intelligence or interrogation training and might as well be as gullible as a child-that is, an innocent, inexperienced child with no capacity to detect blatant lies. Hmm. This was a poor simile, given that his impression of "children" was stuck somewhere between Reinforce Zwei and (though he would never admit it) Vita. Perhaps after Amy and he got married, they should babysit Fate's wards for her. For an Enforcer whose strongest cases centered around dealing with prepubescent children, he was horribly unequipped to deal with them.

Right, back to Scrya's new misadventure. Three rounds of listening to the message had led Chrono to the same conclusion: that it was best to leave Scrya alone and let him handle the incident. It was his library and his responsibility to deal with unauthorized check-outs. As long as nothing else happened to complicate...

The Aces were on vacation.

"Dammit!"

Right on cue, S2U pinged to indicate an incoming call. Chrono sighed. "Patch it through," he ordered, and S2U brought up a holoscreen.

 _"Heya, Chrono,"_ said Amy. _"Just calling from the office. I've got Hayate on hold for you. Something about that airport fire up on the northern coast."_

Chrono began to massage his forehead. "Thanks, Amy. Put her on."

 _"Will do. Oh, and Chrono? Make sure to come home early and get some rest. It_ is _technically your day off."_

Chrono gave her a weary smile. "I'll do what I can."

Amy's face disappeared, and Hayate's popped up in its place. _"Inspector Yagami, reporting in to Enforcer Harlaown. Have you received the report on the incident yet?"_

Chrono shook his head. "No. Is there something about it that should be brought to my attention?"

 _"Well..."_ Hayate paused. _"It's not the fire so much as what caused it. Our scanning teams detected Relic emissions from the airport just before the first explosion. There were multiple explosions, but the rest were caused by incendiary bombs. There was no trace of the Relic after that. Someone teleported into orbit at about that time. We don't have a way to a connection between the two events-the teleport happened shortly before the explosions."_ She paused again. _"I thought you would want to know, for your ongoing investigation."_

Chrono slapped his forehead and left his hand there.

 _"Um, Chrono? Are you all right?"_

Chrono leaned back in his chair. "It's not you, Yagami, it's everything else. That mysterious teleport of yours was just Scrya on library business. He sent me a personal message to confirm it."

Hayate tilted her head. _"Ehh? Library business?"_

"A little girl took some of his books without asking, so now he's helping her with an archaeology project until she gives them back."

Hayate looked very confused.

"Look, just don't worry about it. You're on vacation. If you want the details, just go to Avenata yourself and ask Scrya about it."

Nanoha's head pushed into the camera frame. _"Oh, so that's what he was up to. Maybe we should. I'm sure we can fit that and the hot springs into a week. This sounds way more interesting."_

Chrono sighed. "Look, it's your vacation time. You don't need my permission to do something like that. Just keep the property damage down. No orbital bombardments." He paused. "I would hope that you three are prudent enough not to attempt it with your limiters on. Actually, if that's everything you have to tell me, I'm going to stop talking. You're past the point at which I needed to tell you these things."

 _"Okay, we'll catch up later!"_ Hayate closed the call from her end. Chrono took a deep breath. He just _had_ to go and say something like that. Damn stupid universe and its stupid vacations.

* * *

 **Sooo...I posted this to the SB and SV threads a few months ago and kind of forgot to put it here. Oh well. The chronology still fits.**

 **Chapter 9 is halfway~ish to completion. I'll try to get it out before too long, but senior year of college allows few promises.**


	10. Chapter 9: Exploring the Ruins

Hello, my dudes. Due to my Lenten hiatus from reading fanfiction, I decided to take reader advice and go for a longer chapter. In this chapter, we have our first flashback of the story, as promised, as well as some progress on the plot. I hope this is installment is worth the wait.

Beta'd by no. from SV, who is a gentleman and a scholar.

Chapter 9: Exploring the Ruins

The night's dinner was relaxing after the alternating rush and confinement of the past few days. Madeleine's cooking was simple but judiciously seasoned. Henri and Yuuno discussed some of the former's potential projects, eventually moving on to the background of the Lascaux ruins: dated to the time of Al-Hazard, utterly dissimilar in architecture and design to known Al-Hazardian remains, various artifacts that indicated a high level of matter technology rather than the characteristic ancient magic. Nothing that Brigitte didn't already know.

Rather than listen, she watched Laurent, who was focusing all the stubbornness of his five years on eating neatly and without spilling anything on the tablecloth. His struggles with the knife and fork were... _I better not say anything. He would hate being called cute._

After dinner, everyone retired for the night. Yuuno and Brigitte walked out to the building behind the house, a small cabin. The night air was quiet, yet refreshing.

"After you left us together, Henri suggested that we have Madeleine take us to see the ruins if we want to go before he finishes with his current workload," Yuuno said. He unlocked the door and pushed it open. "What sort of timetable are you on?"

"I'm not in that much of a hurry," said Brigitte, following him in. "We can take our time here. That aside, Madeleine already offered to take us on her own, so there's no reason _not_ to go tomorrow."

"Good. Then we'll work that out tomorrow."

The interior was mostly bare, with an unpolished wooden floor and single bunks set into the other walls. Brigitte ran to the one to the right of the door and hoisted herself up, flopping down on the cot. "You sure you don't want to talk now?"

Yuuno sat on the bunk on the opposite wall. "Are you in such a hurry that you can't wait until we're better-rested?"

Brigitte scrunched her face in concentration. "Hmm...not really." She glanced at him. "So, sleeping as far from me as possible? Is it for symmetry, or is it awkward for you to sleep in the same room as a girl?"

He coughed. "Now that kind of question is a sign that you're too tired to carry on a serious conversation. Good night."

She sighed and closed her eyes. Come to think of it, he had slept as far away from her as possible in their room on the ship, without even a pillow. _Bet there's a story there. And nobody told me about it? Come on!_

* * *

Brigitte couldn't fall asleep.

...

 _"Brigitte."_

 _She glanced up from her work. "Yeah?"_

 _"Do you believe that he can do it?"_

 _She scoffed. "Of course. He may not be you, but he's definitely a genius. He's been working on his complex time theory for years now."_

 _"I wasn't referring to that."_

 _"Huh?" She stopped and gave him her full attention._

 _"We are agreed that, if the experiment succeeds, the prototype must be destroyed, yes?"_

 _She frowned. "What do you mean, doctor? We went over that from the start."_

 _"I have doubts as to whether he can go through with it."_

 _Brigitte's breath caught. "You...don't think he will?"_

 _The man on the other side of the bars steepled his fingers. "Brigitte, you understand what sort of man your father is far better than I do. Tell me: do you honestly believe that, given the opportunity and knowing what we know now, he would eradicate the prototype before it could be studied?"_

 _"Yes." Brigitte stared him down until he blinked and looked away._

 _He sighed. "I will grant that he has the resolve to do as he intends. However..."_

 _"However what?" demanded Brigitte._

 _"What of the younger man, burdened neither by death nor cynicism? What would he do, if told what was to happen?"_

 _"...he would insist that the knowledge was worth the risk, and that he wouldn't repeat the mistakes of the future?"_

 _The doctor smiled. "Who can say? You've always been quick to grasp my meaning. Regardless, someone would insist that sealing and study are sufficient bulwarks against accident. That policy on Lost Logia has served the Bureau well for everything short of the Book of Darkness, and perhaps the Mariage."_

 _He turned his gaze back to Brigitte. "Who can say? Would your father hold firm against his friends in the Bureau? Certainly, they would entertain his words. Yet against his younger self...might he not crack, even the slightest bit?"_

 _"Why are you saying this?" Brigitte crossed her arms. "That's all conjecture. Are you saying we should send Chrono back instead, if we get it working?"_

 _The doctor chuckled lightly. "No, no. Nothing of the sort. I'm sure he would attempt to shut our project down, if he could get here at all." He stood from his chair and began to pace sedately around his cell. "No, I was considering you."_

 _"I'm sorry?"_

 _"Oh, come now, girl. Adventure, heroism; don't they appeal to you? To sweep in under the Bureau's nose and remove the danger with no one the wiser? To see firsthand the fruits of our project and the discovery of travel through time?"_

 _"You're just saying that," mumbled Brigitte. "I don't have Dad's experience. What makes me more capable than him? Besides, this just sounds like one of your schemes from years ago when you would stir up trouble with Lost Logia for your own amusement."_

 _"Miss Scrya. I am entirely serious when I say that I consider you fully capable of fulfilling the task at hand. Your father has trained you himself, has he not? Do you think he held back?"_

 _She sighed. "No. Not since I was a little kid."_

 _The doctor smiled. "Your talent for mathematics is no less than his. With guidance, you have as good a chance as he to complete the project safely. Will you not consider it?"_

 _She shook her head. "This is Dad's brainchild. I haven't done a quarter of the work for it, not compared to the two of you."_

 _"Oh, but you have, and more." The doctor sat down again. "After all, it was you who convinced me to assist and your father to accept my help. My portion can be attributed to you, if indirectly." He smirked. "Consider it. You owe it to yourself, at least."_

...

Well, if that memory didn't put a damper on her mood. Ugh.

She thought of the Dr. Scaglietti of this time and shivered. Had time in prison changed the one she knew that much? Or had he always been like that, and she too young to notice? The way he looked at her like she was an exotic specimen...

What had her Dr. Scaglietti's motive been in persuading her to go? He hadn't bothered to warn her about the isolation inherent to a world where nobody knew her. Talking to Yuuno and Madeleine helped the loneliness, but there was so much she couldn't tell them.

She wanted to go home soon.

* * *

"All right! Are we all ready to go?" Madeleine was practically bouncing with excitement.

"Rea'y," yawned Laurent, rubbing his eyes with his sleeve.

Brigitte let herself smile. "I think so."

"Everybody into the SWERV!"

Yuuno blinked. "The what?"

"Super wacky extra rocks vehicle," Laurent recited in monotone.

Brigitte frowned. "Uhh, I thought it was the spider-washing excellent repertoire vagabond."

"Huh." Laurent frowned back. "That one's pretty good. Can I use it?"

"...Sure."

Madeleine made an exasperated face. "Please stop making fun of my acronyms. That's not even close to the real meaning! While I can excuse Brigitte, you should know better, young man!" She pointed a finger at Laurent.

"Not sorry," he stage-whispered.

Brigitte patted him on the head, but he pushed her hand away. "Never change, Laurent."

Yuuno cleared his throat. "Why don't we go outside and get started on our little trip? It's not exactly a short one."

"Well, it's not long, either," Madeleine said. "Not at our usual speed."

"Oh," said Yuuno. He looked to Laurent. "Should I be worried?"

The boy shook his head vigorously but failed to suppress his smirk.

* * *

This was Yuuno's first time in a wheeled vehicle travelling over a surface that was not a road.

He prayed that today's return trip would be the last.

* * *

"Well, that was fun!" Brigitte's face was plastered with a wide grin, as was the face of the now-fully-awake small child walking next to her.

Yuuno was slowly recovering from a state of shock. "Do you always drive so...so..."

Madeleine looked offended at his grimace. "The purpose of a vehicle is to provide efficient transportation. My driving is the pinnacle of efficiency, as it should be."

"The petulance isn't necessary, please," muttered Yuuno.

"See that arch up there?" Madeleine called from ahead, ignoring him. "The tour begins once we pass through! I hope you brought a light source, because we're going into the caves before long."

Brigitte sidled up to Yuuno but didn't look at him. [I want you to distract them while I look for the things.]

[What do you have in mind?] asked Yuuno.

[Okay, not really distract. More like, keep them company while I wander off on my own. Can you hold this for me?] She handed Yuuno a palm-sized disk with a blinking green light.

[And this is?]

[It's a teleport beacon. That way, I can get back quickly if they wonder where I've gone. I would use telepathy to triangulate, but the walls are pretty close in here, and I don't want to get stuck in one.]

Yuuno thought it over. On the one hand, she hadn't told him just what she would do when she found the device for which she was searching. On the other, she hadn't abused his trust since agreeing to work together. [That's acceptable,] he replied. [Come back once you find it, though. I don't want you to excavate anything today.]

Brigitte glowered at him. [Don't tell me what to do.]

[If it's as dangerous as you say, then you absolutely should not deal with it alone.] Yuuno returned her look impassively. [Both for your safety and my peace of mind.]

[Hmph, fine.] She didn't press it further.

* * *

"And over here, we have the Narcolepsy Room, named for the pictorial depictions of comatose figures on the upper walls and ceiling. You may notice the cyclical nature of the pictures; they story they tell seems to loop back into itself." Madeleine waved at the painted engravings set in the stone of the chamber. "As a general rule, the art found in the caves here is of a cyclical nature. We still don't know what exactly it means about the people who made it, since we've found no written records in this area. The style is also different from the hieroglyphic writing system developed and used by the ancient rulers of Al-Hazard, some of which has survived in the magic systems based around mathematics."

Madeleine was in full tour-guide mode, spouting memorized descriptions of anything and everything in the cave system that comprised the bulk of the ruins. Laurent followed close, standing right behind her when she stopped to explain something in detail, which mostly amounted to 'we don't know anything about this.' Yuuno found himself interested nonetheless; Madeleine's ramblings were full of details that he would not have noticed on first glance. Brigitte seemed interested as well-if she was only feigning an interest while looking for an opening to escape on her own, she was a very good actor.

They came through a tunnel into another room. The lights that lined the walls of the other chambers were conspicuously absent here, leaving the room black except for what light spilled from the tunnel mouths.

"And this is the Chamber of Unbreakable Darkness, named for its natural anti-magilink field," Madeleine explained. "Magic-based light sources will not work here, so this room requires more primitive light sources, like electric filament bulbs." She produced an electric flashlight from a pocket and flipped it on to light the way.

 _A natural anti-magilink field?_ thought Yuuno. He whispered to Brigitte, "Does that mean the boundary here between imaginary space and realspace is weakened?"

Brigitte's reply came a second later. "We think it's a side effect from when the thing I'm looking for was landed here. I told you it rips up realspace when it's used."

"Who's 'we'?"

Brigitte's tone was sharp. "Don't pry."

Yuuno closed his eyes. "Right. Sorry."

"You made a good observation. My source tells me that it should be around this area, within a close radius. I'll want to break off here."

Madeleine droned on as they walked through the chamber, oblivious to their conversation, with Laurent holding her hand. Yuuno and Brigitte began to fall behind.

"How do you plan to give Madeleine the slip without making her panic?" Yuuno could have sworn Brigitte rolled her eyes at this, except that he didn't swear and it was too dark to tell.

"Don't worry, I've got this. I know exactly what I'm looking for. Start up a conversation with her so I can deploy an Area Search."

"How do you plan to do that within the radius of the natural AMF?"

Some light spilled in from the tunnel at the other end of the room. Brigitte scowled. "Of course I'm not doing it in here, dummy. I'm going to let it out on the perimeter and search from there. Once the search finishes, I'll know where to go."

They exited the room into the tunnel, and Yuuno switched to telepathy. [I thought you already knew the location.]

[Well, the tunnels are different on my map! The excavation changes some things, you know.]

Yuuno gave her a flat look. [No need to be petulant. Get started already.]

He increased his pace to catch up to Madeleine and Laurent. As he came next to them, Madeleine gave him a smile. "So, what do you think of the tour so far?"

"It's been quite illuminating," he replied. "I begin to understand the allure this place holds for Brigitte. I'm tempted to come and investigate myself, at some later time. I find the idea of a technological development separate from, but simultaneous to, that of Al-Hazard fascinating." The corridor branched, and Madeleine led them on the left path. "My own excavations, while exciting in their own way, didn't have nearly as much historical significance. Even if this is only a fragment that died here, without making it into the main stream of Al-Hazard's cultural evolution, its mere existence confirms the possibility that other sites like it may have survived."

Madeleine nodded."Yes, of course! That's one of my interests as well. In a few years, when Laurent is old enough to attend school on his own, I plan to pursue an advanced degree in archaeology with a focus on the interplay of ancient magic with Al-Hazard society. It's a small field, but that just means I have more work to do!"

Laurent made a disgruntled noise. "You guys are nerds. Only nerds are happy about more work." He swung Madeleine's hand back and forth impatiently.

Yuuno smiled. "You know, I don't really think that's true. One of my friends is an investigator for the Administration Bureau, and his favorite thing to do is paperwork. He says that as long as he's doing paperwork, it means that nothing's gone wrong that he has to fix."

"And...pardon the question, but how often do things go wrong?" Madeleine sounded genuinely curious.

Yuuno sighed. "Last I heard, he's out of his office two to three days of every six. And none of that is vacation. He doesn't take vacations."

"Your friend sounds boring," pronounced Laurent.

"If you exclude the times he blew up a dozen robots with a single attack and froze a city-sized monster, sure." Laurent spun to face Yuuno, his jaw slack and eyes comically wide. Yuuno smiled. "And those are just the ones I was there for."

Madeleine sighed, but she was smiling too. "Don't lead the boy on like that, Yuuno. There's no way he'll leave you alone if you have stories like that to tell."

Yuuno shrugged. "They're long stories, but I'm willing to tell them if you're willing to listen, Laurent. I can try to keep things cut down to the interesting parts."

"I...I would like to hear about your experiences, too," said Madeleine, almost timidly. Then she looked back. "Wait, where's Brigitte? Wasn't she with us?"

"No," said Laurent. "She took the other path back where the tunnel split up."

Yuuno gave him an appraising look. "You're quite observant, Laurent."

"I know! I have to be, since I want to be a ship captain like Uncle Gerard when I grow up," the boy said, nodding firmly.

Madeleine looked back up the tunnel. "Was she not paying attention and took the left path by mistake?"

"That depends," said Yuuno. "Where does that path lead?"

"Nowhere in particular," said Madeleine. "That's the area for the new excavation; there's nothing there yet."

"I see," said Yuuno. "Now tell me, Madeleine. Why did Brigitte come here in the first place?"

"She wanted to do archeological work of her own," Madeleine replied. "That's what she told me."

"That is indeed what she said. The question is, did she go off on her own out of innocent curiosity or out of malicious, rule-flouting curiosity."

"I'm...sorry?" Madeleine's mouth hung open in surprise, as if she couldn't reconcile the words with his nonchalant tone.

"Never mind that. Let's go look for her. That's what you would suggest, isn't it?" Yuuno met Madeleine's eyes. She flinched and looked away.

"Do you not like Brigitte?" asked Laurent.

Yuuno sighed and squatted down next to the boy. "That's a very complicated question. It's not that I don't like her; it's that I don't know her well enough to trust that she wouldn't leave the group on purpose." He glanced down the tunnel. "That, and she's not enough of an airhead to miss the path in a blank tunnel with nothing to distract her." He stood up, took a few steps in the direction they'd come, and turned around, shaking his head. "I'm sorry. It isn't like me to vent on acquaintances. I've spent the last three days with her, and the lack of proper communication has been...trying, to say the least."

"Of course," said Madeleine, breathily. "That's...quite understandable. I won't mention it to her."

Yuuno nodded. "Thank you."

Madeleine took Laurent's hand and the three began to retrace their steps down the tunnel.

* * *

Brigitte climbed over a pile of debris. The tunnels in this area were only partially cleared; some of the ones on her map weren't visible at all. They were also dim, lit only by a conjured light spell that Brigitte carried with her. Apparently, the excavations had not yet reached this area.

That was fine. As long as she could get to her target location, or sufficiently close to it, Brigitte could excavate on her own.

With a mental nudge from her, Calliope projected the holographic map of the cave system. Another nudge overlaid it with the updated map of the tunnels' current condition, the first in green, the second in blue. Brigitte squinted at the display and examined her projected route, highlighted with a soft yellow. Based on the condition of the tunnels, she would have...at least two blockages, and maybe a wall to break through. Hopefully, no more than that.  
She slid down a short slope of loose rocks and started to sing softly.

"Hopokk had a talk with neighbor Neviden.  
'Come out, see the sun, and have a bite of grass.'  
Neviden said, 'Again? Must you tempt me from my den?  
All you have by day is horrid sand that turns to glass.'"

Coming to a cavern with many openings and hollows, she checked her map and crawled into the second opening from the right. She had to get on her hands and knees to fit through. Fortunately, her barrier jacket kept her skin from getting scraped.

"'How is that a way to behave,  
Luring me from my lovely cave?  
There's water here, but none to save  
For a greedy lump like you.'"

It was harder to sing while crawling, but she managed.

"'Don't impeach my motives so.  
I'm giving you a place to go,  
to find things you might never know,  
and the warmth of the sunlight, too.'"

She broke off as the tunnel widened, giving her room to stand and brush herself off. "I wonder if I'll see any nevidens down here today?" Brigitte twisted her torso to slip through a group of stalagmites. "Calliope, do you sense any?"

[Negative. Wide area search not deployed. Vital scans impaired in Navagation Device shell.]

"Oh well," sighed Brigitte. "Let me know if you see any."

[Affirmative.]

"This situation kind of makes me the hopokk, doesn't it?"

[...Answer unresolved. Query: intended as metaphor?]

Brigitte patted the Device on her wrist. "Good job, Calliope. I told Dad I could teach you."

* * *

Chrono tapped at his desk irritably. "Is there nothing else? No more possible leads?"

Amy shook her head. "No, that's everything."

Chrono scowled. "At this rate, I might have to track Scrya down so I can question the girl as a witness. He might not even know about the fire yet."

Amy shrugged. "Maybe not. Do you have a way to contact him?"

"That's the other problem." Chrono got up from his desk and started to pace back and forth. "Six years, Amy. Six years as the Chief Infinity Librarian and the man still doesn't have a personal Device. If he had one, I could request a long-distance connection, but right now, I only know the planet. I can't cover a planet with telepathy, especially not a planet two days' travel away on an unregistered vessel. No, we're stuck waiting for him to contact us." He halted and laid his hands on the desk again.

Amy put a hand on his shoulder. "I think you could stand to be a little more calm about this situation, Chrono."

He groaned. "I would be a little more calm about this if I knew _what the hell was going on over there._ "

"Vacation time is always rough," said Amy. She sat him down in his chair again and ruffled his hair in a comforting gesture. "I'm sure something will turn up. It usually does."

* * *

Brigitte took a deep breath. She had almost reached her destination. The only barrier left was the solid rock slab blocking the entrance to the chamber, right where the excavation report said it had been when Dr. Durand had found it.

"Well, we're here," she said to Calliope. "Scan it for weak points, please."

[Scanning. Warning: field irregularities detected. Some scanning functions impaired.]

"That's expected, since we're so close." Brigitte ran her free hand across the slab's dark surface. It was polished smooth, with only a little dust.

[Scan complete. Density significant. Brute force inadvisable.]

Brigitte sighed. "No punching, got it."

[Durability of subject almost certainly exceeds maximum assisted impulse of gauntlet form.]

Brigitte cracked a smile. "Now you sound like Dad." She took a step back and swept her gaze around the giant doorstop's edges. "So, wedge it out with forcefields and binds, or try to cut through?"

[Unlikely to work.] Calliope flashed. [Cross-checking database for possible methods...]

Brigitte pondered. When faced with a problem, the proper response was to step back and reduce the problem to its most essential components. Goal: get into the chamber on the other side of this rock. Obstacle: the rock was blocking the way, and she couldn't phase through walls. Solution: remove the rock. Blowing it up was out; fists wouldn't do the trick, and shooting magic might blow up the whole chamber, if she had any spells strong enough for the job (she didn't). That left moving it. Direct approach with physical constructs-also out, which left...

[Suggestion: teleportation magic.]

Brigitte frowned. "I thought you would tell me that a teleport in an irregular mana field was highly inadvisable."

[Clarification: teleport rock, not self.]

Ah. Still inadvisable under normal circumstances, but much less dangerous than teleporting herself inside the room. Brigitte snapped her fingers. "That's a decent idea. Set it up, please."

[Request acknowledged. Setting up.]

Calliope expanded, components from its parallel-space storage unfolding to form a gauntlet over her hand. Brigitte's barrier jacket flared, adding an active protection layer, visible as a brown cape designed to mimic what her father wore in old pictures. Brigitte lifted both hands in front of her. "Calliope, find me the spot with the least interference. I'll cast unassisted from there."

[Two steps to your right, one step back.]

Brigitte followed the directions and focused. While teleporting herself was muscle memory at this point, she had less practice teleporting other things from a distance-that was more of her father's thing. She estimated the dimensions of the rock, factored in Calliope's estimate of the mass density, and chose a clear space about three meters from the rock's starting position. It _seemed_ feasible, but you could never quite tell with unknown mana field distortions...well. She would just do it and hope for no explosions.

Adding and scaling the required vectors in her head, she focused on the flow of mana through her linker core and squeezed. A teal-green magic circle flared to life under the rock, which shimmered and vanished, reappearing with a similar shimmer approximately seventy centimeters from the desired spot. Brigitte frowned. "Distorted mana fields are no joke, huh? That's way more error than I expected." She gingerly started walking toward the now-open entryway. Suddenly, the rock tipped over and crashed to the ground, showering her with splinters. Brigitte beckoned her floating light closer to it and was able to make out hairline cracks across much of the stone's surface, as well as strange ripples where it had been completely smooth. Paling slightly, she turned away and passed through the doorway.

The ceiling rose above her, fading into blackness that her small light couldn't quite pierce. Scant reflections flickered from polished carvings on the near walls and geometric patterns in a floor mosaic. Brigitte waved her hand, summoning three more lights, which she sent ahead of her in different directions. With the extra illumination, she could make out the grays and reds of the stone, with some of the black material of the late door, Kaiser rest its soul, mixed in. The patterns on the floor were radial, all leading to the center of the circular chamber. Somehow, it made her think of a kind of shrine.  
Of course, she'd seen this chamber before and thought the same then. The only different thing was the massive lump of purplish-black metal embedded in the rock where the floor patterns intersected. It seemed to pulse faintly, reflecting deep violet rays she could barely see while devouring all other visible light. Rising at an oblique angle, it towered almost to the chamber ceiling.

 _Well, here I am,_ thought Brigitte, _and there it is. The Lost Logia that started this whole horrible mess._ Now, it was time to destroy it and prevent the ensuing tragedy.

And immediately, the moment was ruined, as Brigitte realized that she had neglected to think of how, exactly, she would destroy the equivalent of a ship's drive in an enclosed cavern in the center of a magic distortion zone.

"Merde. I should have asked the Doctor for some explosives."


	11. Chapter 10: Wherever You Are

A month and a day later, I return with a new chapter. It's a little shorter than I would like, but my beta and I felt that keeping just what's here was the right decision. I hope to have the next chapter out in two weeks, maybe, to compensate.

Oh, and I graduated from college last weekend. There's that.

Beta'd by SV's no., who is the very model of a modern major general.

Chapter 10: Wherever You Are

Brigitte rushed through the tunnels, retracing her steps. _Okay, status. Location of the Lost Logia, obtained. Demolition tools, unavailable at the moment. Allies, questionable. I_ really _don't want to deal with Doctor Scaglietti again...Yuuno might help, but he still hasn't made up his mind..._

She checked the position of Yuuno's beacon on her map. Now that she was outside the mana distortion zone, she could accurately track the rest of the party. The quickest route was... _actually, taking a slight detour will be better, if only to decrease the probability of my path being traced later. At the rates that we're moving, I can meet up with them in the chamber with all the side paths. Maybe I can get through without crawling this time. Then just slip through here, and...aha! There they are._ The cleared tunnels led directly to this chamber, so it was unsurprising to find the rest of the group here already. _Now, nonchalance on three, two..._

"Oh, there you guys are! I was looking for you." Brigitte scrambled down a short slope, skidding on loose stones. She came to a stop in front of them. "I didn't think it would take quite this-"

"What were you thinking?" Madeleine snapped.

Brigitte froze. _Oh...I didn't plan what to tell her._ A knot tightened in her stomach. She hadn't planned for this reaction from the older girl.

"I expected better from you." Madeleine's eyelids fluttered despite having nothing to wipe away, a sign that she was trying, and failing, to keep her temper. "I really don't understand it. Were you just impatient? I didn't think you were the type. You didn't strike me as thoughtless, either. What excuse do you have for disobeying the regulations and separating from the group?"

Brigitte glanced at Yuuno, but he shook his head minutely, keeping silent.

Madeleine stalked over to Brigitte and glared down at her. "Look at me." Brigitte turned her head away. "Look at me!" Madeleine shouted. Brigitte flinched and obeyed. Madeleine's expression softened, but only a little. "Brigitte, did you take the wrong path on purpose?" The girl hesitated, but finally gave a weak nod. "And why did you do that?"

"Because I wanted to see what the unexcavated parts looked like," Brigitte mumbled. "I didn't intend to get lost. Besides, Yuuno and I have a tracker just in case."

Madeleine frowned. "If you wanted to see the untouched area, you could have asked. This is going to make it difficult to trust you in the future. I hope you realize that."

Brigitte looked down. "Yeah."

"And you're not sorry."

Brigitte sighed. "No, I'm not."

Madeleine's breath hissed between her clenched teeth. She turned to Yuuno. "Don't you have anything to say to her?" With a thoughtful air, Yuuno looked at her, Brigitte, and Laurent in turn. The little boy was visibly uncomfortable, fidgeting in place. Brigitte felt much the same about the situation.

"Not here," Yuuno said at last. "I'll speak with her when we've returned." He turned away and began to walk back the way they had come. "It's about time to leave if we want to be in time for dinner. Henri shouldn't have to cook his own food." He paused. "Also, Madeleine, try to be a little less exuberant with your driving. I would prefer to keep my appetite, if possible."

In silence, they followed him, Madeleine going last, holding Laurent's hand. Brigitte glanced back at the older girl as they re-entered the polished tunnel. The signs of anger on Madeleine's face had faded away into disappointment.

Brigitte couldn't decide which expression made her feel worse.

* * *

 _The study door opened quietly, and a teenage boy slipped in. "Hey, 'Gitta! Good to see you! How have you been?"_

 _The little girl crossed her arms indignantly. "That is not my name, Laurent."_

 _He laughed and ruffled her hair. She squeaked and tried to push his hand away, but it was too late. "Lighten up, cousin. Don't be so formal all the time."_

 _"Well, maybe_

you _could stop being such a tease."_

 _He laughed again. "Nope. You should join me instead of complaining about it. I heard the Psychology Association is going to add teasing to their official list of love languages."_

 _She glared at him. "You're making that up. Nobody shows affection by teasing except you."_

 _He cleared a spot on her desk and sat down, letting his legs dangle. "I wouldn't be so sure about that. I've seen your mom and dad tease each other on multiple occasions. I mean, it's a good way to prove you have a sense of humor. People are always going to do silly things, right? If you can't laugh about it, what's the point? Besides, if you're serious all the time, people won't like taking your advice as much."_

 _She leaned back in her cushioned chair. "So I should be funny if I want people to listen to me."_

 _"Yes," he replied, completely serious._

 _"This is not actually just another joke?"_

 _"Hey, I take my psychology studies very seriously, you know. Understanding how people tick is the first key to being a good leader."_

 _She frowned. "I thought that was your decision-making skills."_

 _He leaned closer to her. "Well, you can't make good decisions if you don't know how to predict what your sailors will do, right? Right?"_

 _She pushed his head away. "For your information, I was working before you came in. Please stop distracting me."_

 _He slipped off the desk and examined some of the papers she had out. "What's this? Your homework from school?"_

 _She scowled. "No, this is the mathematics from Daddy and Uncle Henri's new project. I'm using it as practice for calculating quaternions in my head."_

 _Snerk._

 _She whipped her head around. "What?" she demanded._

 _"Sorry, you just said mathematics and Daddy in the same sentence. It's like, you talk like a kid and not like a kid at the same time."_

 _"Ugh!" She squirmed out of her chair and pushed her cousin toward the door. "Get out! You are not helping anything!"_

 _"Well, I thought it was funny." Still smiling, he let himself be evicted from the room. Still fuming, she slammed the door after him._

* * *

When they returned to the cabin, Brigitte and Yuuno sat on their bunks, both avoiding eye contact. Brigitte felt a lecture brewing, but she had no way to prepare-this situation was a completely new experience, and she had no idea what Yuuno might say.

After a while, he raised his head and looked intently at her. "What did you think would happen?"

Brigitte didn't have an answer to that.

With no answer forthcoming, Yuuno continued, "I'll give you my analysis; you can tell me if I'm wrong. You rushed off at the first opportunity without thinking your actions through. This seems to be habitual with you, jumping into things and dealing with consequences only when you can't avoid them any longer." He sighed deeply, then fixed her with a harder look than she had seen on him before. "Both of us have been holding back from the other. We tried a limited partnership, and since it isn't working, I'm going to stop holding back what I really think. I hope you can do the same."

Brigitte's throat felt suddenly dry. "I can't promise anything."

Yuuno sat up straighter and crossed his arms. "Unfortunate, but we passed the stage for bargains and promises long ago. Just listen for now. It's clear that you only intended to work with me as long as it was convenient; I suspect you allowed me to come with you so I wouldn't involve the Administration Bureau, for reasons you never explained." He sighed. "I must admit, I'm at a loss there, given that the containment of dangerous Lost Logia is the explicit reason for the Bureau's existence."

Brigitte scoffed. "And how has containment worked as a strategy, pray tell?"

Yuuno raised an eyebrow. "Much better than you seem to think. The number of known extant Lost Logia too powerful to be safely sealed can be counted on one hand."

"That's not my point," Brigitte growled. "It's what people do with it after it's sealed that counts. Nobody outright destroys a Lost Logia unless it's a hive of self-replicating murder robots or something. It's always, 'oh, we sealed this dangerous thing, now let's study it so we can replicate the dangerous bits in a controlled fashion.' That kind of thinking is stupid and gets people killed."

"That is a gross oversimplification-"

Brigitte cut him off. "No, listen. I agree with you, you can count the Lost Logia on the level of the Book of Darkness on one hand. I know I'm making a straw man argument. But can you blame me? Do you know what all this research into Lost Logia produces? Weapons! What do weapons do? Kill people!" she shouted, punctuating each sentence with an angrier gesture. "The TSAB is military, and every time it picks up a new toy, that just invites escalation from all the petty crime rings mooching off their tech. I don't want anything to do with the organization that let Project Fate and the Combat Cyborg fiasco go on right under their noses-" and suddenly Yuuno was right in her face.

"How do you know about Project Fate?" Brigitte flinched back, opened her mouth, and belatedly realized what she had just said. "Or should I say, what do you know about Project Fate?" demanded Yuuno, tension building in his formerly expressionless features. Brigitte slid to the side, scrambling to her feet, and backed away. Slowly, evenly, Yuuno followed her, his eyes locked with hers.

She wanted to look away, but she couldn't. "Don't...don't look at me like that."

His hand slammed into the wall near her head. "Start talking."

"I..." Words wouldn't come. Her tightened throat felt about to choke her. She wanted to scream, to run, anything to get him to _stop looking at me like I'm a criminal!_

Her body glowed teal. A teleportation circle flashed under Yuuno's feet, and he had only time to look surprised before vanishing.

 _That won't hold,_ she thought, her analytical side struggling with her emotions. _He'll be back here in a few seconds._ Almost on autopilot, Brigitte tapped Calliope's bracelet form and let herself fall into a very familiar routine-teleport tag.

Part of her wanted to fall down and cry. The other part said no, focus on the calculations. One mistake could cost her the game, and the stakes had never been quite this high.

* * *

Yuuno materialized in the desert outside the city. He looked around in the low light, frowning. Brigitte's-the girl's-teleport chain had led here, but her magic signature was missing. A decoy! The last link in the chain was fake, unless her concealment skills were higher than he thought...worrying about that would waste time. He concentrated on his previous location.

...

He opened his eyes. He could still sense the spent mana from her teleport, but not her directly. He rose into the air to get a better look at the surroundings. This area held scattered rocks and brush, what might have been an oasis in the past being slowly overtaken by sand.

"I know you're here," he called. "Don't bother hiding. Even if I can't find you now, I know what you're after, and I've already called in backup from the Administration Bureau." He paused, but no answer came.

A vital scan revealed the presence of several small animals, but nothing of the girl. Had her head start allowed her to escape completely? Yuuno grimaced, then turned and flew at top speed back toward the city. He had to contact Chrono while enough time remained for communication to matter.

* * *

From under a rock, a ferret dragging a bracelet wiggled out of an abandoned hopokk den, shuddering. In a shower of teal sparks, it transformed into a human girl, who promptly collapsed and burst into tears.


	12. Chapter 10i: Reflections

Holy cow, I forgot to post this. I am so sorry for making you guys wait. Anyway, here's a much-needed flashback chapter with some more of Brigitte's backstory. Enjoy!

Beta'd by no.

Chapter 10+i: Reflections

It began before she was born. When Brigitte's parents married and decided to start a family, they moved back to her mother's homeworld. Aside from the occasional trips to Mid-Childa to visit family friends, or to attend conferences with her father when she was older, she spent most of her life on Avenata. It was home.

Naturally, that gave her a front seat to the discovery and study of the Imaginary Space Proto-Vessel, as her uncle called it. Not a catchy or imaginative name, but her uncle was paid to conduct research, not public relations.

Her earliest clear memory was a specific incident from the time when she was three and a half.

...

 _Uncle Henri staggered into the room, haggard and pale but grinning ear-to-ear. Brigitte's mother caught him before he fell and dropped him into a comfortable chair._

 _"I've done it, Madeleine!" he gasped. "I finally pieced together the meaning of the inscription!" He pushed a crumpled paper into the woman's hands. "It was...ah, if not for the second set of tablets, I'd have had no way to relate the hieroglyphs to known language. With this, we might be able to safely excavate the site, now that we have an idea of the function of the Lost Logia..." He trailed off, taking in a shuddering breath._

 _"Oh my," murmured Brigitte's mother, her hand over her mouth. "So that's what it does."_

...

Her uncle's absolute elation, his painfully obvious exhaustion notwithstanding, sparked something in Brigitte. It may well have been the defining moment of her life, in that she would later choose to follow her father's path as an archaeologist.

Sans the wild adventures at a young age, of course. Brigitte was an efficient, introverted, bookish sort and wouldn't have enjoyed them, even if her parents had allowed it.

Perhaps that was why her inclination to spend time with her father's friends from off-world was rather low.

...

 _"Did you and Vivio have fun together?"_

 _Brigitte tilted her head back and forth, thinking. "Well...we did a lot of fun things, but she doesn't really like most of the things I like. She always talks about adventures or fighting or how she's going to get a job as an Air Force mage. Is that because she's a teenager?"_

 _Her father smiled fondly. "I think she's just excited about being able to follow in Nanoha's footsteps. I'm sure you'll have more to talk about next time you see each other. Or is this about her dragging you around to all the interesting places without a chance to rest?" Brigitte's face scrunched up, and he laughed. "It can't be helped, I suppose. She's always been the energetic sort. With Nanoha and Fate as her role models, I wouldn't expect anything else."_

 _Brigitte raised her hand. "Father, I wanted to ask about that. Why does Vivio refer to both Ms. Takamachi and Ms. Testarossa as mother?"_

 _He frowned. "I thought I told you that she's adopted? Nanoha and Fate are her joint legal guardians. They adopted her when she was very young."_

 _Brigitte frowned. "But why? Did her birth parents not want her?"_

 _Her father closed his eyes and clasped his hands meditatively. After a slow breath, he turned his chair so he sat eye to eye with her. "Brigitte, Vivio doesn't have birth parents." When Brigitte only blinked, not comprehending, he added, "Have your biology study materials mentioned cloning?"_

 _Gradually, Brigitte's eyes widened. "Is Vivio a clone?" She thought for a moment. "But don't clones still need DNA from a mother and a father?"_

 _Her father sighed. "Vivio was cloned from a DNA sample of the last Sankt Kaiser, Olivie Sagebrecht. From what I know, there were no genetic alterations. I assume that she gestated in an artificial womb."_

 _"But then where did the embryo come from?"_

 _Her father closed his eyes. "I don't know, Brigitte. Nobody asked Dr. Scaglietti how he made her."_

 _"Who's Dr. Spag-Spaghet-Scaglietti?"_

 _Her father sighed again, more deeply, resting his head in his hands. "He...was the scientist who cloned Vivio from the Sankt Kaiser's DNA. I suppose he's the closest thing she has to a father. Just, he didn't raise her, or really do anything else for her, so he's not her real father. And he also did a lot of bad things, which is why he's in prison for life."_

 _"Oh," said Brigitte. "Did he perform a lot of unethical human experimentation?"_

 _Her father blinked in surprise. "Where did you learn about_ that _concept?"_

 _She shrugged. "It was referenced in my biology study materials and I looked it up."_

 _"I'm going to have to take a look at those study materials of yours," her father muttered._

 _Brigitte pretended to ignore the comment. "What do people do in prison?"_

 _Her father steepled his fingers in thought. "Hmm...I know in some places, prisoners with long sentences are made to perform unskilled labor work, but in maximum security facilities, there's not much allowed beyond basic exercise and occasional visitors." He leaned back. "I know Teana and Subaru visited Dr. Scaglietti once for an investigation. I'm not much of an expert on prisons, so I suppose you'll have to do some research on your own, if you're interested."_

 _Brigitte beamed. "Okay! Thank you, father." She turned to leave._

 _"...I wouldn't mind being called 'Dad', you know..."_

 _Not knowing how to respond, Brigitte simply left the room._

...

Of course, Brigitte's personal research was insufficient to answer many such purely academic questions, so she had to get in contact with the experts. Over the next few years, she began a series of correspondences with her father's aid. Most were simple exchanges of information. Others were more...complicated.

...

 _"I warn you, be on your best behavior while my daughter is present. Visitation privileges can be revoked if you do not adhere to a proper standard of conduct."_

 _The man on the other side of the partition chuckled. "Oh, Dr. Scrya, there's no need to worry about me. I have learned_ many _lessons during my stay here. Prison life does wonders for a man's sense of discipline."_

 _"You know the reasons for my concern," said Brigitte's father, unamused. "That being said..." He glanced at Brigitte, and his tone softened. "You had questions for Dr. Scaglietti?"_

 _Brigitte nodded. "Could you...not be here while we talk, please? It would make me feel overly self-conscious if you stay."_

 _He raised an eyebrow._

 _"Father, we talked about this. I'll even discuss the transcript of the interview with you later, if you want."_

 _He sighed. "All right. I'll, just, be over there, if you need me." He walked away._

 _Doctor Scaglietti chuckled. "I have quite the respect for your father, you know. He's probably the second greatest authority on Lost Logia in Administrated Space."_

 _Brigitte rolled her eyes. "The first being yourself, obviously."_

 _The doctor spread his hands, shrugging. "Well, I had the advantage of time, resources, and illegality. Besides, I hardly ever made modifications to existing systems, except those of my own design. But really, I do envy him the firsthand experience of the Jewel Seeds and the Book of Darkness in their natural habitats. When I had Jewel Seeds, I had to restrict myself to using them as mana batteries. It was somewhat dull, but I simply couldn't risk the appearance of a monster in one of my facilities, you understand."_

 _"Do you always ramble like this?" asked Brigitte._

 _Doctor Scaglietti tapped his fingers against the glass. "Ah, my apologies. It's become a tendency of mine, I've been told. Ever since my arrest, I've had little chance to do anything. My only activities are meals, basic exercise, and the occasional visit. The wardens won't allow me near anything with moving parts; I'm sure you understand why."_

 _Brigitte stared flatly at him. "Well, I would appreciate a more direct approach to answering my questions. Anecdotes are fine, but I would prefer to avoid tangents."_

 _The doctor smiled. "Of course, of course. Ask away."_

...

Eventually, Brigitte got tired of taking her individual questions to Doctor Scaglietti and petitioned that he be given paper with which to write scientific essays.

It wasn't long afterward that she began to seek his help with calculations concerning a proposed method of travel through imaginary space. By the time her father found out, their collaborative contribution to the rehabilitation of the Imaginary Space Proto-Vessel was unmistakable, and he had to bring them aboard the project.

News of Doctor Scaglietti's involvement must have got out, for barely a year later...

...

 _"I...will speak with Dr. Durand," stated the visitor._

 _Brigitte frowned. "Who's asking?"_

 _"I will speak...with Dr. Durand," the man repeated._

 _"What is your name?" Brigitte countered. "Whom will I announce to Dr. Durand as visitor?"_

 _The man stared at her, stonefaced._

 _Brigitte glared in response. "If you can't answer a simple question, I'm going to have to ask you to leave." She attempted to shut the door, but the man's hand shot out to hold it open._

 _"My name...Corolla," he rasped._

 _Her uncle's voice came from the top of the stairs. "Brigitte, is there someone at the door?"_

 _Still struggling to close it, she called back, "Yes, it's somebody named Corolla who wants to speak with you!"_

 _"Bring him up. I'll see what he wants."_

 _Brigitte lost her grip on the doorknob, staring incredulously at the empty staircase. Blinking, she turned back to the stranger and stepped aside. "Uh...this way, Mr. Corolla."_

 _She led him upstairs to her uncle's office and rushed to the neighboring room as soon as he entered, pressing her ear against the wall. There was something_ not right _about that man, and she had to ensure her uncle's safety._

 _Or, maybe, she was falling victim to paranoia because she didn't like the man on first impression. Trying to keep both possibilities in mind, she strained to hear the conversation._

 _"You are building a weapon. I will have it." The stranger, Corolla. He sounded more...lucid._

 _"I'm sorry?" This was her uncle. "I have no idea what you mean. None of my projects are intended for military use. I am an archaeologist."_

 _"Do not lie." Corolla's voice was a growl. "Doctor Scaglietti is involved. There is a weapon."_

 _"I have had no contact with Dr. Scaglietti. His contribution is the responsibility of my niece's husband, Dr. Scrya."_

 _"A vessel that can traverse imaginary number space. Nothing could stop it. The Bureau cannot have it. Give it to me."_

 _"Sir, calm down. I cannot give you what I have not built!"_

 _"Hnnn...prototypes, blueprints. Everything. I must have it."_

 _"Mr. Corolla, you have been grievously misinformed. The project in question is an attempt to replicate the function of an artifact that_ claims _to safely traverse imaginary space." Her uncle was starting to raise his voice. "There are nothing but calculations and a dead machine that has not been operational in over a thousand years. Your demands are ridiculous."_

 _"Give it...to me. I will judge the value."_

 _Her uncle huffed angrily. "If you do not intend to listen to what I say, I must request that you leave. Pray do so before I am forced to call the police."_

 _The room was silence. Brigitte could hear nothing but her own heartbeat._

 _Then something crackled, and her uncle screamed. Drowning out both, a bestial howl of rage erupted, seeming to come from everywhere. Brigitte clapped her hands over her ears, but the noise pierced into her brain ruthlessly. She gasped from the pain, and realized something._

 _"Calliope," she hissed, "block telepathy!" The noise almost instantly cut out, leaving behind a much fainter and hoarser cry eching from beyond the wall. "He's...he's attacking Uncle Henri...Calliope, send a distress signal! The police, Father, Mother, anyone!"_

 _ **[Negative. Communications jammed.]**_

 _Brigitte's hands fell limply to her sides. Shuddering, she breathed in and out. "Calliope. Could you repeat that?"_

 _ **[Communications jammed. Long-distance transmissions not possible.]**_

 _Brigitte collapsed on the floor, suddenly hyperventilating. The screams had already died out, leaving only the crackling of open-air electricity._

 _That too died away, eventually._

 _ **[User Alert: Communications open. Confirm distress signal with recipients: Lascaux Gendarmerie, Yuuno Scrya, Madeleine Vert Scrya.]**_

 _Brigitte shot up with a gasp. "Yes! Confirm! Send it now!"_

 ** _[Command confirmed. Transmitting.]_**

 _Brigitte was already dashing into the hallway. Blood pounded in her ears as she stumbled into her uncle's office. The stranger was gone. Her uncle lay slumped over the desk, his throat covered in burns._

First step of first aid, _thought Brigitte._ Don't panic. _The self-reminder helped, if only a little._ Second step, lay patient on a level surface. _She gripped her uncle under the armpits and hoisted him out of the chair and onto the floor. He was heavy, but she managed._ Third step, diagnose the injury. _She examined what she could see._ Burns and bruising on the neck. No breathing.

 _...He wasn't breathing._ How do I deal with this? People die after four minutes of oxygen deprivation to the brain. A healing spell. That's my only option!

 _Healing was her weakest area in magic. The one basic spell she had practiced, Physical Heal, wasn't even registered in her device. She had never expected to need it. Now she had to go by memory._

Physical Heal, centered around the throat, _she thought. She took a deep breath. "Calliope, run a vital scan while I cast." She closed her eyes and focused. The equations for the spell took a moment to recall, but she had properly memorized them, even if she hadn't practiced. She checked them over again, to be sure._

 _Slowly, steadily, the mana pulsed from her hands into the wound. The room's light seemed to dim and draw together in contracting ripples. Brigitte could feel that the spell formula was working as intended, but that meant only so much. Physical Heal would do little for a concussion or stroke._

 _"Calliope," she said. "Results?"_

 _ **[Scan complete. No vital signs detected. Conclusion: subject deceased.]**_

 _The words didn't register. "Repeat that."_

 _ **[No vital signs detected. Conclusion: subject deceased.]**_

 _Brigitte stopped casting and lowered her hands. After a pause, she slumped backwards, letting her hands rest in her lap. Her gaze remained on her uncle's body._

 _They found her sitting there, unmoving, with two dried-out trails of tears on her face._


	13. Chapter 11: An Inconvenient Serendipity

Chapter 11: An Inconvenient Serendipity

When Yuuno returned to the Durand house, the first action on his mind was to communicate with Chrono. It had been remiss of him not to arrange for contact options in case of emergency, he realized. He should have asked Chrono for backup, rather than insisting he could handle the situation without help. He knew better than that.

Entering the house, he spotted Madeleine at the table, sorting documents. Holding down his frustration, he walked toward her. "Madeleine, do you have a communications terminal that I could use?" he asked.

She glanced up. "Ah, there's one upstairs. What do you need it for, if I may ask?"

He considered his options, and finally replied, "I need to contact home. Brigitte and I have had a falling-out."

Madeleine gasped. "It's not about what I said, is it? I thought I might have reacted too harshly. I just...I just didn't think she was that kind of girl."

"No," said Yuuno, softly shaking his head. "You're not to blame. I allowed the matter to escalate as it did." He sighed. "Be that as it may, it is rather important that I send my message as soon as possible."

She nodded vigorously. "Of course! I'll show you where it is right away. Feel free to take as much time as you need."

* * *

Yuuno went to bed immediately afterward. Searching for Brigitte after he'd already lost her trail would be fruitless. Resting and waiting for help would be more productive than wasting his energy to scour the desert all night.

When he woke the next morning, he was alone in the cabin, as he had been when he went to sleep. Brigitte's bed was untouched. There was, however, a piece of paper on the table that had not been there last night.

After a few moments' hesitation, he walked the short distance to the table and picked up the paper. It was a short letter in unfamiliar handwriting.

 _Dear Mr. Scrya,_

 _I apologize for my behavior of last night. I should not have panicked as I did. However, the topics then mentioned being a sensitive subject, I will only say that the Bureau is not free from the influence of corrupt or power-hungry individuals who will attempt to weaponize any new technology resulting from the analysis of Lost Logia. Be careful._

 _I had hoped our partnership would not fail such as it has, but it was inevitable, given the volume of information that had to be kept from you. I am glad that I was able to spend time with all of you, though I wish it could have been on better terms._

 _I'm sorry I had to withhold the truth._

 _Brigitte_

The name was signed in a decorative script, decked with the simple embellishments of a child's imagination.

Yuuno closed his eyes. His hand clenched around the paper, then let it fall.

Even after all his efforts to reach out to her, he still didn't understand what sort of person she was.

* * *

Brigitte had not slept well the previous night. In fact, she had hardly slept at all. It wasn't ideal for her circumstances, but sleeping in the open was hardly safe, whether in the wilds or in the city. Both hopokks and little girls had to beware of predators.

She'd left Yuuno a note after making sure he was asleep. That was the only risk she was willing to take at present; she walked the rest of the way to a public area rather than teleporting.

It was odd, she thought as she sat on a park bench waiting for sunrise, that even with her introverted personality, she never disappeared into the background as she sometimes wished she could. Someone would always notice and try to pull her out of her shell; Laurent, her father, her mother...

...come to think of it, she'd survived her trip to the past so far without time alone. Back when she was young, she would get "peopled out" after only a few hours. Perhaps she had changed more than she knew.

Brigitte cracked a smile as a tired giggle broke from her throat. Several more followed, and she stopped trying to hold them in. Heaving with inane laughter, she let her head fall into her hands and marveled at the horribly inconvenient state of her affairs. What had been the use of going to this time's Dr. Scaglietti at all? She had become entangled with Administration Bureau personnel on her own, despite planning to keep them out of it. She hadn't strictly needed to raid the Infinity Library, either. Why had she bothered? Was it just to prove she could? Or had she been looking for attention, for some sort of affirmation?

 _It shouldn't matter what Yuuno thinks of me,_ she thought. _He's not my father yet. Was I really so desperate for companionship that-_

"Why, Miss Vert! Fancy seeing you here this early. Is it a habit of yours to view the sunrise from here?"

Slowly, Brigitte turned her head to stare at the owner of a certain conspicuously innocent voice. "Mr. Cobalt." Under normal circumstances, she would have tried to hide the grimace that she felt coming on. She felt the awkwardness of not giving a full reply, but she couldn't think of anything polite to say to him. All that came to mind were disparaging witticisms.

The smuggler waved his hand in front of her face. "Miss Vert? You seem distracted. I was expecting a witty comment to the effect that it's impolite to inquire about a young lady's habits." He frowned. "Are you all right? You look rather exhausted." Brigitte just stared back at him. Nothing came to mind for her to say. Frowning, Astrus sat down on the bench a few feet away from her. "Mis Vert, if you need to discuss something, or have need of any service I can provide...well, I won't be going anywhere for a little while, and I can charge the doctor for any costs incurred. I've no reason not to help you."

"And you have a reason _to_ help me?"

He spread his palms. "Perhaps, perhaps not. However, I tend to consider a working relationship...an investment, shall we say, for the future. I do, in fact, understand the concept of delayed gratification, dear miss. Please excuse me if I gave the opposite impression."

Well, if he was offering..."I need chemical explosives for demolishing a stationary target. Anything magic-based won't work."

"Hm." Astrus scratched at his goatee. "And the requirement is annihilation, rather than burial, to be precise? The necessary tools would vary depending on the scenario."

"...Annihilation, yes." It wasn't the word she would have used, but it was adequate.

"Good, good. So, what are we—sorry, you—destroying?"

Brigitte slowly inhaled and exhaled. "Heavy machinery in an unexcavated section of the ruins. If not for the MD field, I could have teleported it out, but..." She shrugged.

"I see." Astrus stared vacantly ahead, tapping his fingers idly on his forearm. "I expected Montignac, once you mentioned the MD field...I suppose a few shaped plasma charges could do the trick, given a primarily metallic construction. It's a fringe technology, due to Administration Bureau influence, but I believe I could get a few on short notice with a bit of cash and a favor or two."

...Now that sounded suspicious. Practical Rule #1 of socioeconomics: nobody does you a service for free unless you have a preexisting bond of friendship or affection. And given the strictly business nature of her relationship with the man..."What do you get out of this?" Brigitte asked. "Is Dr. Scaglietti paying for you to babysit me? My deal with him did not cover any such thing."

Astrus looked at her suspicious squint and burst into laughter. "Oh, that's refreshing! I'll never get tired of that old-fashioned, childlike cynicism." He composed himself. "Your question is valid, however, and deserves an honest reply. Did he pay us extra for a psychological profile of you, based on our observations? Yes. Have I been tracking your general whereabouts? Possibly. What do I get out of this? Why, the chance to facilitate and finance a girl's first real adventure!" He leaned closer, expectantly. "This is your first real adventure, I assume?"

Brigitte grimaced. "Yes," she said, "but you'll excuse me for finding that motivation entirely implausible."

Astrus looked a little put out. "You're not the first to say so," he muttered. "Look here, I'm not claiming altruism of any sort, far from it. It's like the way a rich fellow with more credits than he knows how to use will fund a crackpot scheme on one of those reality serials on the net, just to use his money for something. Not that I'm quite that solvent, mind you," he added, taking a serious tone, "but my day job pays well enough, if you know what I mean."

"Because it amuses you, then," said Brigitte, unimpressed. "And how many children's adventures have you funded, pray tell?"

He flashed her a crooked smile. "You're my proof of concept, young lady! The concept being, of course, whether I find the execution of such ventures sufficiently motivating to make of them a habit."

"Your phrasing is as dubious as...as everything else about you."

"Thank you! I appreciate that, coming from you. Perhaps you could sneak in a comment about my face next? I hear it's quite the popular jibe among your age group these days."

Brigitte huffed. "I don't have friends my age, so I wouldn't know."

"I suppose we have that in common," Astrus hummed. "Do you know, I've not been liked by anyone of my acquaintance for at least fifteen years?"

Brigitte buried her face in her hands. "Please, stop."

"Only if your spirits are sufficiently mended for a serious discussion of logistics." Abruptly, his voice was cold.

Brigitte felt a headache coming on. I can't deal with this, she thought.

Astrus waited, his expression unchanging. Finally, Brigitte let out a breath held in for too long and managed, "Logistics. Let's...let's talk about logistics."

"Good," said Astrus, sharply. "Now, if you could provide concrete details on the size, composition, and general construction of the objects to be demolished, we may proceed in selecting ordnance. If you please?"

"I have the schematic right..." Brigitte had Calliope bring it up. "...right here."

Astrus appraised the diagrams with a raised eyebrow, standing and leaning in to take a closer look at the projection. "May I?"

She nodded, and he brushed his fingers against the hologram, rotating here, enlarging a section there. "This is quite detailed," he murmured.

"It's a composite," Brigitte said. "Some of the notes are mine; the rest are originals." Original to her father and uncle rather than the device's inventors, but Astrus didn't need to know that.

"I see. It's fortunate that you have the internal components mapped. This way, we can dissect it with a plasma cutter before resorting to explosives. Will dismantling and disposing of it piecemeal be acceptable? It will be more cost-effective."

After a moment, Brigitte nodded and said, "The less I'm in your debt, the better."

"Quite, as collecting from you may be difficult."

Astrus asked a few more questions about minor details, and Brigitte answered as concisely as she could manage. Finally, the man stood back and nodded. Brigitte deactivated the projection.

"Thank you for your time, Miss Vert. Let us meet by the entrance to the ruins in fifteen hours' time. I suspect you need the sleep."

'You'll be ready by then?" she asked.

"Assuredly." He raised his hand in a cursory three-fingered salute and turned to walk away.

"Wait."

He stopped and raised an eyebrow.

"Please. Which is your...real face? This, or...the other thing?"

He was silent for a long moment, and Brigitte feared she had offended him—wasn't that a change—but he simply said, "I achieved habits of efficiency only through hard work over many years. They require much mental effort to maintain; therefore, it is natural to conserve that effort except when necessary or particularly expedient."

Brigitte continued to stare blankly after him long after he had gone. Eventually, she roused herself. She had little more than fourteen hours to rest. She ought to make the most of them.

* * *

Roughly ten and a half hours later, Brigitte awoke and realized that she wouldn't be able to get any more sleep than that. It would take her most of the remaining allotted time to get to the ruins on foot. She didn't dare fly or teleport—anyone could be watching. And Yuuno...would he be able to detect a minor use of magic from her if he wasn't actively searching for it? She didn't know how good his sensory capabilities were. Best not to risk it.

She had just enough coins left to purchase a bottle of water before setting out.

* * *

Astrus stepped back to admire his highly illegal combustion-powered plasma cutter. The true struggle of this venture was to pack a complete set of usable equipment into something he could carry alone. This device was just the thing to bring.

Paula grunted, moving some heavier machinery behind him. "Hey, Astrus. You done fussin' wi'that thing?"

Astrus sighed. _So little patience._ "Quartermaster Chevron, I am aware of my own timetable, thank you. I'll arrive on location exactly on time and no earlier." Paula snorted contemptuously in lieu of reply. She knew better than to engage him in a battle of pedantry. For all her stubbornness, she could never make him give a straight answer against his will.

Astrus was rather proud of his perfect record of arguments driven to silence.

"Ya know," Paula began, "I kinda feel sorry for the kid. I wouldn't have minded her as a repeat passenger."

"Well, if she didn't want to be taken advantage of, she should have gone to—" Astrus broke off. "I was going to say the Administration Bureau, but..."

Paula barked a laugh. "Yeah, we know how that one goes. Least we're honest about what we do."

If only afterwards, Astrus thought. He wouldn't deny that he had enjoyed the girl's company, but enjoyments were cheap, so to speak, and a potential paycheck was worth more to him than negotiating an honest bargain.

* * *

Chrono paused in his packing. Amy was hovering at his office doorway with a questioning look. He turned. "Yes, Amy? What is it?"

She eyed his assortment of items waiting to be put into S2U's dimensional storage. "Chrono, where are you going?"

"Avenata. Scrya ran into trouble."

Amy's face grew serious. "How bad?"

"He spooked the girl, and she ran away."

"Oh." Amy sighed, then rolled her eyes. "Figures. Are you going because it's serious, or because you have nothing else to do?"

"The girl knows something about Project Fate."

Amy gasped. "A new lead."

Chrono returned to packing. "Potentially. We've had nothing since the Mondal boy. That's why I can't let this go by."

Amy nodded. "Got it. You have your transport lined up?"

"I've already booked the long-range teleport pad," said Chrono. "I can't legally go there directly from Mid without permits, so I'm taking a second jump via Tsania IV."

"The planet with the volcanic beaches?"

"No, you're thinking of Tirunia. Not even remotely close."

"Wait, I remember! That hundred-story shopping center your mother took us to! That was on Tsania."

"...Yes. That one." It had been a trip.

Amy drifted into the room and pulled Chrono into a hug. "Stay safe," she whispered. "If you get hurt, we'll have to delay the wedding."

Chrono wrestled an arm free and brushed at her hair. "I'll be fine. Just get that cowlick fixed in time for the pictures."

* * *

 **I'm baaaaack! Sorry for the wait.**


End file.
